David's Kitchen, AKA Cooking with Cats: A mini banquet.....Part 1

Part 1 - the day before:

So, to start off, having made a fair amount of masala, its time to make some dishes, courtesy of and/or based on Prashad Indian Vegetarian Cooking by Kaushy Patel and Great Curries by The Hairy Bikers - Si King and Dave Myers.

Here's the menu - to be served all at once -

Lila dhania baath - Green Coriander Rice
Sukhu bataka - Spicy Picnic Potatoes
Bombay bataka - Tamarind, tomato and potato curry
Vagareli makai - Spicy sweetcorn
Chicken Tandoori/ Tikka type thing
Minty yoghurt dip

I made all the basic masala in advance (see previous post) but there is one other element to do in advance - marinating the chicken. (You can do it all on the same day - say marinate at 9am for serving in the evening - but it is much better to marinate overnight in the fridge)

So, first of all then, make the marinade.
You will need:
Green cardamom seeds - from about 15 to 20 pods dependend on size, but should equate to about a tablespoon of seeds
Coriander seeds - 2tsp
Cumin seeds - 2tsp
6 cm piece of cinnamon quill, broken up into pieces
10 cloves
3 or 4 Kashmiri Dried chillies - ripped up into pieces but retaining the seeds

Take a heavy saute pan, dry heat for a minute or so an tip all the above into the pan to roast off. Keep an eye out, shake around a bit and above all, make sure nothing burns! When you can smell the spices easily and they have released their oils, tip the lot into a mortar.
Grind the whole lot up into a powder, tip into a large bowl, and add some grated nutmeg (I used about a third of a normal sized nutmeg), some cayenne pepper, paprika and turmeric, 3 cloves of garlic and 3cm root ginger - both pulped. I used my Garlic Twist for this (see getting started sections)
to this add about 4-5 tablespoons of natural yoghurt - I use Yeo Valley Natural Organic full fat, and mix up well.
Take your chicken - I used 4 skinnless supremes from a local award winning butcher - Chapmans - and carve up into decent sized chunks. Place in the marinade, mix together, cover with clingfilm and put in the fridge overnight.

ripped up dried kashmiri chillies