When I lived in Tokyo there was a sweet chain of Indian restaurants that my friends, family, and I frequented.  I have no clue why we loved Indian food in Japan so much, but it was fabulous.  I’ve never had anything like it in America, but my family and I love Indian food, and I’ve found a super duper shortcut to make relatively authentic-tasting chicken curry all the time!

My mom likes this a lot and her birthday was yesterday (she turned thirty!!), so this is in honor of her.  I’m going to make curry for you soon, Mama!

Indian Chicken Curry

The secret, you see, is curry paste.  It’s sold in jars in every grocery store known to man now, and it’s FABULOUS.  You could make your own curry paste or use curry powder, but I find that with a few additions this has a GREAT blend of spices that people love all the time!  I sometimes add veggies or shrimp to this sauce but for today I made it with just chicken – creamy, fabulous, and simple.

Here’s what you need:

• 1 lb chicken, shredded (rotisserie chicken would work great here!)
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 finely diced onion
• 3 cloves minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons curry paste
• 1 teaspoon ground or dried oregano
• cayenne pepper, to taste
• 1 teaspoon chili powder
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1/2 cup half and half or heavy cream (or go healthy: use skim milk with 1 teaspoon flour dissolved in)
• 1/2 cup plain yogurt
• 16 oz crushed tomatoes or tomato sauce (not marinara, the kind in the jars)

If it’s still a little pink it’s OK!  It’ll go back in the sauce and cook some more later.  Once you can handle the chicken, shred it with two forks or your fingers.

Now let’s make the sauce!  First, dice up the onion and garlic and saute it slowly and gently over medium heat for a few minutes with the oil.

Now, gather up your other ingredients.

The curry paste is key here!  There are a few brands I use, but I use curry PASTE, not SAUCE, and make my own sauce.  The flavor is fabulous and TRUST me, it’s a great $3 investment.  Also note the very expensive tomato sauce.  It was $0.49.

And stir it all together.  Let it cook here for another 2 minutes.  Once the spices have cooked, add the yogurt and one can of tomato sauce…

Then stir it all together.

Once the yogurt (or sour cream, no matter) and tomato sauce have mixed together, add the cream or half and half and HALF the second can of tomato sauce.  Stir everything together and taste!  Here I usually add more curry paste because I like a very intense curry flavor, and more cayenne for spice.

Add the rest of the tomatoes and more half and half as needed until the sauce is orange, creamy, and flavorful.  Then, stir in the chicken and simmer to heat through.

This is seriously amazing.

Please make this this weekend for someone you love!  Watch Slumdog Millionaire while you’re at it.  Serve it with white rice, pita or naan bread, pickles (if you’re weird and Asian like me) and sweet yogurt slaw to offset the spicy sauce.

Perfect.  Wonderful. Spicy. Creamy. ENJOY.