Chicken Shashlik

Recipe for two healthy sizzler full portions

As I cook this in a very hot tandoor. I find if I cook the vegetables interspaced with the chicken pieces - the norm for lower temp cooking - the vegetables will over cook because at 400c the veg will be cooked in 3-4 mins whereas the chicken pieces will take 6-7 mins. Therefore for best results I cook them apart on separate skewers.

Ingredients

500g Chicken breast cut into bite size pieces
Half each of red, green and yellow capsicums
2 large mild chilies
1 large onion peeled and divided
2 medium tomatoes halved
2 shallots
Oil
1 tsp chaat masala

Marinade

1 tsp peeled and grated garlic
1 tsp peeled and grated ginger
2 tbsp white wine vinegar
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp mustard oil
1 tbsp garam masala
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
half tsp turmeric
half tsp cayenne
half tsp salt

Method

Mix all marinade ingredients together. Add chicken, mix well and allow to marinate for 24 hours.

Rinse excess marinade from the chicken. Dry with kitchen towel, load onto 2 skewers, brush with mustard oil and cook in tandoor for 6-7 mins

Toss prepared vegetables in oil and chaat masala.  Load onto 2 skewers finishing with the whole shallot at the bottom. Add to the chicken in the tandoor and cook for 3-4 mins.

Sizzle of and serve garnished with fresh coriander.  I find this dish is equally nice eaten with a salad or rice with a masala sauce madras hot drizzled over.

Masala sauce madras hot here https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=5835.0
   
Coogan 2011

Could you clarify this one step, please ?

Quote from: coogan on July 26, 2011, 02:58 PM
Rinse excess marinade from the chicken. Dry with kitchen towel, load onto 2 skewers, brush with mustard oil and cook in tandoor for 6-7 mins

When you say "rinse", rinse with what, exactly ?
** Phil.

Sorry Phil If it was not quite clear - I meant rinse the excess marinade from the chicken with running water then dry with kitchen towel. Thank you for spotting the error.

bon point

Ah, running water : that will indeed remove a great deal of the marinade !  I confess that when I attempt this dish, I keep as much marinade on the meat as possible, so as to try to keep it moist -- I can see I shall have to try a more aggressive approach to de-marinading.

** Phil.

It's interesting that Coogan washes off the marinade. Sometimes my tikka seems too cakey on the outside for want of a better word. Some of the BIR tikka I've bought doesn't have a thick coating of marinade so I might give this a go next time.

Cheers,

Paul

Hi Coogan,

That looks absolutely stunning mate, really got my mouth watering.

I notice that you cook this in your Nipoori, so, may I ask, how would you recommend that those who don't own the Nipoori, cook the shashlik?

400c for 3-4 minutes is very quick and I should imagine it makes for nice, tender, juicy chicken.  My worry would be trying to grille or BBQ the shashlik and drying out the chicken too much.

Many thanks in advance,

Ray

Phil, Paul I have found that if you have marinated the food correctly with the right ingredients for long enough the flavour would have fully penetrated and the excess marinade becomes redundant - if it is left on it just impedes the cooking process and will actually burn marring the true flavour that you are after. The whole ethos of extreme high temperature cooking in a tandoor is that the outer food surface is immediately exposed to the ambient heat to seal the taste and moisture in whilst equally important the heat rapidly conducts up the skewer to do the same from within. This causes the skewed food to cook in at least half the time and retain its moistness and fully impregnated flavour along with the additional unique 'smoky' taste that the charcoal burning at high temperature imparts.


Bon taste

QuoteThat looks absolutely stunning mate, really got my mouth watering. I notice that you cook this in your Nipoori, so, may I ask, how would you recommend that those who don't own the Nipoori, cook the shashlik? 400c for 3-4 minutes is very quick and I should imagine it makes for nice, tender, juicy chicken.  My worry would be trying to grille or BBQ the shashlik and drying out the chicken too much. Ray

Cheers Ray, They tasted stunning as well. Sorry I should have included times for conventional cooking. Just do them in the same way as you do your tikka I would say 15-20 mins grilled or BBQ'd turning the skewers once or twice - you could probably get away with interspacing the veg with the chicken. They will still taste great but yes they will obviously be drier but still very nice.

bon jovi