Chicken Tikka Masala

“I am not a glutton – I am an explorer of food.” ~Erma Bombeck

Exactly.

Thank you, Erma. I could not have said that better myself.

I am not a glutton. I like food. I like traveling. I like adventures and experiencing new things. I have always loved learning about something that I didn’t know existed and I especially have always loved visiting new places—no matter how far or near my home they may be. Any new experience is usually worthwhile. Food experiences, too.

As a kid, we had to at least taste something new. If we didn’t like it, we didn’t have to eat it, but we had to taste it. My dad would never accept us saying we didn’t like something without giving it a try.

And so we ate all kinds of things, any kind of animal, food from all cultures, nothing was off limits. My life is still that way.

Indian Food

I first had Indian food while living in Chicago. I was never exposed to it growing up, but living in a big, very diverse city, allowed me the opportunity to try it. I loved it immediately!

And so I was really looking forward to making this next Cook the 40 recipe, and seeing how well I would do at making my own Indian food.

Photo of the magazine cover. — Best-ever recipes? Challenge accepted!

Cook the 40

Why take on Food & Wine’s best-ever recipes from their forty years in publication? Because if you’ve been paying attention, you know that’s one of the things I’m doing this year!

Besides, I’m hoping that taking on these 40 recipes will also add some fun and new favorite foods to my life. If even half of them end up being tasty, this will be a worthwhile endeavor. Again, new food usually is!

40 Years of Food & Wine

According to the September 2018 anniversary issue of Food & Wine, and editor Hunter Lewis, https://twitter.com/notesfromacook?lang=en, what makes a good recipe is it being delicious, of course, and (I think even more important sometimes) the best recipes “tell a story worth repeating.” Well said, Hunter.

I am not sure what kind of stories these 40 best-ever recipes will tell from my kitchen’s point of view, but I am excited to find out, and taste just how well these recipe stories will taste.

I was excited to make this recipe. As much as I love Indian food, I had never made it.

The 12th Recipe

Chicken Tikka Masala by Grace Parisi. Wow, I first thought when I saw this recipe in the magazine. Can I make this? Will I be able to find the spices needed to cook this at home in San Antonio, Texas? The answers were and are yes and yes!

While I am certain that there are many, many Indian recipes that are very complicated and likely do contain ingredients that I can’t get here at home, I am so glad that this isn’t one of them. This recipe was so delicious! In fact, it is one of the best meals I have ever made. It really was that good!

I had never cooked with cardamom or garam masala!

The savory yogurt marinade.
The chicken had to marinate overnight.

Out of the refrigerator the next day, and ready to start cooking.

Let’s Get Cooking

As I wrote above, I was able to find all of the ingredients to make this, and while it took a little time and timing for everything, it was not complicated to make.

Truly though, after tasting it, I’d make it again even if it would have been more complicated!

Oh, the smell of the spices!
Adding the tomatoes…
…and then the cream.
Chicken ready to be cut into thick slices.

Added the chicken to the creamy sauce. The kitchen smelled so good!

Where Was I When This Recipe Was Published in 2003?

As Food & Wine was publishing this recipe in 2003, I was living in Chicago, in a condo in the South Loop area of downtown.

We didn’t travel anywhere “significant” that year, and I can’t really remember us doing anything that spectacular.

I know we likely visited some museums, went to baseball and hockey games (because we did that every year), ate out quite a bit in restaurants around town, and we likely made several road trips to visit our parents in Indiana and Missouri, but as I’ll have to confess again below, I have no photographic evidence.