Tandoori chicken as the rest of the world knows it was made famous in Delhi — at Moti Mahal in Daryaganj, where Punjabi cooks who had carried the clay-oven craft east from Peshawar set chicken, slashed and marinated in spiced yoghurt, against the fierce heat of the tandoor. The marinade does the work: yoghurt to tenderise, ginger, garlic and green chilli for bite, garam masala for depth, and the slashes cut to the bone so all of it reaches the centre. The restaurant orange is cosmetic — classically food colouring, more honestly a little Kashmiri chilli. Without a tandoor the trick is heat, and the home benchmark is the cookbook writer Madhur Jaffrey, born in Delhi, who worked out how to get the char and the moisture from an ordinary oven turned as high as it will go. This version follows her method, made for a corridor kitchen with no clay oven in it.
INGREDIENTS
- 1 kg chicken pieces (legs and breast, skinned)
- 1 tsp salt
- juice of 1 lemon
- 300 g about 1¼ cups plain yogurt
- ½ onion (roughly chopped)
- 1 garlic clove
- 2.5 cm piece fresh ginger
- ½ green chilli
- 2 tsp garam masala
- 1 tsp Kashmiri red chilli powder (for colour)
- lemon or lime wedges (to serve)
- sliced onion and mint chutney (to serve)
METHOD
- Skin the chicken and cut deep slashes into each piece so the marinade can reach the bone.
- Rub the pieces all over with the salt and lemon juice, working it into the slashes, and rest 20 minutes.
- Blend the yogurt with the onion, garlic, ginger, green chilli, garam masala and Kashmiri chilli to a smooth marinade, pushing it through a sieve if you want it clean.
- Coat the chicken thoroughly, making sure the marinade goes into the slashes; cover and refrigerate 6–24 hours (the longer the better).
- Heat the oven to its maximum setting.
- Lift the chicken from the marinade, shaking off the excess, and arrange in a single layer on a rack set over a baking tray.
- Bake 20–25 minutes until cooked through and charred at the edges, turning once.
- Serve hot with lemon wedges, sliced onion and mint chutney.
