The Butter Chicken Recipe

This is it. The reason I tell people to buy an Instant Pot: the butter chicken recipe from famed Instant Pot Food Blogger Urvashi Pitre who literally is called “the butter chicken lady”. The first time I tried this I told my wife we aren’t ordering Indian takeout anymore.

Yeah, this is a good one . . .

ingredients

• 2 pounds boneless chicken breast(her recipe calls for 1 but I like plenty of meat in my curry)
• 1 can of diced tomatoes(14 oz) with juices
• 5-6 garlic cloves
• 1 tablespoon minced ginger
• 1 teaspoon turmeric
• 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 2 teaspoons Garam Masala(a curry powder blend)
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon salt
• a stick of butter, cut up
• 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
• 1/3 cup chopped cilantro (for the ‘gram)

essential equipment

• Instant Pot

It starts off so simply. Dump the tomatoes with juices from the can, the garlic, ginger, salt and spices into the Instant Pot. Mix well.

Put that chicken in the tub. Set the Instant Pot to High and cook for 10 minutes + a natural release.

Urvashi’s recipe calls for 1 pound of chicken and says there is more than enough sauce to reserve. In my house, one pound chicken ain’t enough. You can easily double the amount of chicken. Which is what I did here.

Remove the chicken and set aside. Now it’s time to make that magical sauce.

The thought of making Butter Chicken sounds intimidating because of how velvety the sauce is in restaurant versions. Cue the immersion blender. This butter chicken recipe is magic because of its use of magical gadgets: the Instant and Pot and immersion blender. Simply put they are game changers.

Honestly, the sauce is good as is once you blend it, albeit fairly spicy. But this is a butter chicken recipe after all so . . . we are gonna need that butter. And cream.

Believe it or not, the calorie count isn’t astronomical. I wouldn’t call this a diet dish but the richness of the butter and cream means you can be satisfied with a bowl or two. Ok, maybe three.

Cut up the reserved chicken and add it to the sauce. I found that the cream really lightened up the color of the sauce so I reached for a dash or three of paprika for color. Get yourself some rice, some dal and get down with a bowl of this:

A feast for the ages and a huge reason why I have stopped ordering Indian takeout, even in the age of Covid-19. Yes, this butter chicken recipe will rethink your need for takeout Indian. So good and such a crowd pleaser.

And for what it’s worth, I do save some of the sauce. I have a couple containers in my freezer and I feel like a Popeye’s fried chicken sandwich hack with this butter chicken sauce is in my immediate future! Hope you enjoy this one as much as I do.