With Easter just round the corner, it is time to start planning for the menu for Easter Sunday’s breakfast and lunch. Somehow, dinner never seems to be planned unless you have family or friends visiting you for dinner. Probably cos after a meat-heavy breakfast and lunch, all you want is something light or probably manage dinner with the left-overs from breakfast and lunch!
Chicken Varutharachathu is a typical Kerala-style preparation of chicken curry. The term ‘Varutharachathu’ in Malayalam means fried or roasted and ground to a paste. The base and the flavours for this delicious curry comes from grated coconut which is slow roasted along with spices till it is a nice golden-brown color. It is then ground to a paste and added to the curry. The aroma from the roasted coconut is actually quite mouth-watering.
This Kerala style Chicken Varutharache curry can be paired with rice, porotta, appam, nool appam or rotis. So you can make this ahead and serve it for your Easter breakfast or lunch!
Chicken Varutharachathu
Course: MainCuisine: Indian, KeralaDifficulty: Moderate4
servings10
minutes30
minutes40
minutesA kerala style chicken curry flavoured with roasted and ground coconut and spices.
Ingredients
- For marination
Chicken – 500 gms
Turmeric Powder – 1/8 tsp
Chilli Powder – ½ tsp
Salt – ½ tsp
- For coconut paste
Coconut Oil – 1-1.5 tbsp
Fennel – ½ tsp
Cardamom – 2
Cinnamon – a 1-inch piece
Cloves – 2
Peppercorn – ½ tsp
Grated Coconut – ¾ cup
Curry Leaves – a few
Coriander Powder – 1.5 tsp
Chilli Powder – 1 tsp
- For the curry
Coconut Oil – 1.5 tbsp
Onion – 1 medium, chopped
Ginger – ½-inch piece
Garlic – 4-5 cloves
Green Chilli – 2, split
Curry Leaves – a few
Tomato – 1 large, chopped small
Salt – as per taste
Garam Masala – ½ tsp
Directions
- Wash and clean the chicken pieces and drain off the water.
- Add turmeric powder, chilli powder and salt to this and mix well. Keep it aside while you prepare the curry.
- In a pan, add oil. To this, add fennel, cardamom, cinnamon, cloves and peppercorn.
- Next, add the grated coconut and curry leaves to the oil and cook on low-medium heat till the coconut changes to a golden-brown color.
- To this, add the coriander powder and chilli powder and cook till the spices are roasted. Take it off heat and let it cool down a little.
- Transfer this to a mixie jar and grind it to a fine powder without any water first. Then add a little water and grind it to a paste form.
- In a kadai, add coconut oil. When the oil has heated up, add the onion, ginger, garlic, green chilli and curry leaves and cook till onions are translucent and start changing color.
- Add tomato and salt to this and cook till the tomato pieces are cooked well.
- To this, add the ground masala paste and mix well. Add some water to the mixie jar to remove all the masala from it and add it to the kadai. Add some more water to the kadai and mix well and cover and cook for a couple of minutes till the gravy boils well.
- Add chicken pieces to this and let it come to a boil. Cover and cook till the chicken pieces are cooked well.
- Remove the lid and let it cook on high flame till the gravy thickens a little.
- Finally, add the garam masala, mix well and turn off the heat.
