These are even better than they sound!
A few months ago, I received chef Chetna Makan’s book, “Chetna’s 30 Minute Indian,” as a gift. The first recipe I tried was butter chicken, of course, because it’s so delicious. It was a big hit with my daughter and friends, and we’re looking at other recipes to try in the future.
Recently, we had dinner at a relatively new Indian restaurant in our area, Saffron, in Fairhaven, Massachusetts. Excellent food and service. We had a great meal. But what peaked our curiosity was their butter chicken wings. Wings! I thought that was genius.
So I took their idea, and using Chetna’s recipe, I gave it a shot. They came out fantastic!
Measurements in my recipe differ from the cookbook due to the large amount of chicken wings I used (5 lbs.), but the actual ingredients are the same. I also needed to change the way it was cooked, because the wings were large and had bones, where the original butter chicken recipe used boneless, skinless chicken thighs cut into smaller pieces.
5 lbs. large chicken wings
5.3 oz. container (150g) plain yogurt
5 tablespoons mustard oil
1 tablespoon Kosher salt
1 tablespoon Kashmiri chili powder
2″ piece of ginger, peeled and grated
4 garlic cloves, grated
I prepared the chicken wings by chopping off the tips. (But I do save them in a plastic freezer bag for future chicken stock.) Then I chop the wings at the joint to make two pieces from each wing. I set them aside.
The tips will be used later in for chicken stock.
In a large container that will hold all the wings, I combine the yogurt, mustard oil, salt, chili powder, grated ginger, and garlic. Mix it well. Add the chicken wings and make sure they are really well coated with the marinade. You can let it sit for ups to 3 hours at room temperature, or longer in the fridge.
Mix well.
A tip for fresh ginger: This is something I learned from a local farmer that raises her own ginger. I keep it in the freezer in a plastic freezer bag. When it’s time to grate, I simply take the frozen ginger and grate it, skin and all. The skin completely disintegrates and you don’t have to peel it. Then just put the unused ginger back in the bag and back in the freezer.
After marinating, spread the chicken wings onto a large sheet pan in a pre-heated 350 oven, and bake for 20 minutes.
While that’s baking…
2 tablespoons oil
100g salted butter
8 cloves
8 cardamom pods
2 cinnamon sticks (3″)
2 bay leaves
16 oz. passata, or pureed canned tomatoes
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
2 teaspoons chili powder
2 teaspoons garam masala
2 tablespoons Kasoori methi (fenugreek leaves)
Add the oil and butter to a pan over medium-low heat. Add the cloves, cardamom, cinnamon sticks, and bay leaves to the pan, and warm the spices for a few minutes.
Add the passata, salt, chili powder, garam masala and Kasoori methi to the pan, mixing well. Cover the pan with a lid and let it cook for about 10 minutes on medium-low heat. Don’t let it burn.
After 10 minutes, remove the lid from the pan and let it cook a few minutes more to reduce just a bit. Take the pan off the heat and let it cool to room temperature. Using a slotted spoon, remove the cloves, cardamom, cinnamon and bay leaves.
You don’t want to crunch on these!
Pour the contents of the pan into a large bowl, big enough to hold all the chicken wings.
After the wings have cooked 20 minutes, pour off any of the fat in the sheet pan and place the wings in the bowl with the pan sauce. Mix gently, but really well to make sure the wings are really covered with sauce.
Place the wings back on the sheet pan (pour all leftover sauce on top)and bake at 350 for another 15 minutes, until the chicken coating starts to caramelize and get sticky.
2 tablespoons cream or half-and-half
2 teaspoons clear (and runny) honey
Mix the cream and honey together in a small bowl. When the wings come out of the oven, let them cool for a few minutes, then drizzle the cream and honey all over.
I served the wings over plain jasmine rice, and some sautéed carrots from my garden.
Live the Live ™ 