Are you squeezed for money but yearn for your favourite takeaway? Here’s one British Indian restaurant favourite you can prepare at home; Chicken Pathia.
Cook More Curries At Home
- The Curry Secret: How to Cook Real Indian Restaurant Meals at Home
- The New Curry Secret
- How To Make British Indian Restaurant (BIR) Style Meals
- Rick Stein’s India
Shortly before everything went tits up in my personal life last year – you can read a bit more about it here – I visited Namaaste Kitchen to shoot three favourite restaurant recipes. Chicken Pathia is the first one.
Located in Camden, Namaaste Kitchen‘s dining area might be narrow and the kitchen small, but taste the food and you’ll think you’re in heaven. In fact, to date it is my favourite Indian restaurant in London. You simply must order the Goan-style Sea Bass and Sesame Baby Aubergines!
Unlike Korma and Tikka Massala, which are very creamy, heavy and calorific, Pathia – a Parsi dish which is a fusion between Persian (Iranian) and Gurarat cuisines – has a tomato base and is sweet, sour and spicy in flavour. By multiplying ingredients, its a great recipe for batch cooking and freezing. Since the sauce is so versatile you can substitute the chicken with lamb, prawns or vegetables. If thinking of using one of the latter two ingredients, cook the sauce first and add the cooked ingredients afterwards.
If you look elsewhere for Pathia recipes on the web you’ll find that most Indian recipes start with a base sauce and then different ingredients are added according to the style of curry you’re after. Restaurants use this method because they work in massive quantities and creating the base sauce and cooking the meat in it first simply saves some time and effort. Don’t worry though, this recipe is straight forward and for the home cook.
It’s always a good idea to get all your ingredients ready before you start cooking. This is a simple one pan dish.
That’s it, people! If you look at the list of ingredients, follow the instructions and look at the photos, you’ll see it’s a really easy dish. You can tweak the ingredients to how hot, sweet or spicy you like it. Not only is it healthier than most restaurant curries out there, but it is low-fat, diabetic friendly, gluten and lactose free!
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Chicken Pathia
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 4 servings 1x
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Pin RecipeIngredients
- 45ml (3 tbsp) vegetable oil
- 500ml (2 cups) chopped onions
- 10ml (2 tsp) garlic, crushed
- 5cm (2 in) fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped
- 1 bay leaf
- 1.25ml (¼ tsp) salt
- 1.25ml (¼ tsp) turmeric powder
- 450g (1lb) chicken breasts, cubed
- 2 green chillies, finely chopped
- 5ml (1 tsp) cumin powder
- 5ml (1 tsp) ground cayenne
- 250ml (1 cup) chopped tomatoes
- 15ml (1 tbsp) tomato puree
- 2.5ml (½ tsp) white vinegar
- 10ml (2 tsp) brown sugar or jaggery
- 1 fresh lime, juiced
- 125ml (½ cup) water
Instructions
- Heat oil in a heavy saucepan. Add the onions, garlic, bay leaf, salt and turmeric powder and fry until the mixture turns golden brown. It should take about 5 minutes.
- Add the chicken to the pan and brown the meat.
- The other spices: chillies, cumin and cayenne should now be added and stirred in thoroughly.
- Add the tomatoes and fry until they form a shiny paste and the oil starts to separate.
- Add the tomato puree, vinegar, lime juice, sugar and water.
- Taste and adjust seasoning as needed. Simmer for 10 minutes then turn off the heat and let it rest for 10 minutes.
- Sprinkle chopped coriander on top and garnish with a slice of lime.
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Pan Fry
- Cuisine: Indian
Nutrition
- Calories: 294
- Sugar: Sugars
- Sodium: 208 mg
- Fat: 13.3 g
- Carbohydrates: 15.9 g
- Fiber: Dietary Fiber
- Protein: 25.3 g
- Cholesterol: 72 mg
wow Michelle – this is one of the curries I grew up eating. Delicious! and yet never make it much at home.
Also like the way you are working with restaurants and reproducing recipes from them for the home.
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Thanks for sharing this wonderful recipe with us! Mouthwatering…
Cheers,
Rosa
This looks amazing. I’m going to try it this weekend, but with cauliflower instead of the chicken. Thanks for the step by step pictures!
Wonderful pictures and recipe Michelle – it’s great seeing something cooked up in a professional restaurant kitchen like that! I love a curry 🙂
You’re lucky to have grown up with Pathia, Nazima. I only discovered it 3 years ago and since then it’s become my favourite curry.
As for shooting with chefs in restaurant kitchens – it’s great fun!
Thanks, Rosa!
Pinning this to my ‘to make’ board – really interesting post.
I love being able to see the steps involved in this recipe with your greg photos. It really helps and also gets me thinking how I could eat curry every night quite happily! Thanks for reminding me!
I love homemade curries – they’re so much healthier than restaurant or takeaways.
I’m such a demon for curry and I have fond memories of dining there… another post due me thinks 😉
That looks delicious. I know what I am going to eat tonight.
Michelle, this looks really good, and I love an easy one pan meal that is ready in a hurry – thanks for a great recipe!
Chicken Pathia is one of my favorite meals from the moment I first tried it. Will definitely try your recipe!
Chicken Pathia is one of my favorite meals from the moment I first tried it. Will definitely try your recipe!
Just made this and it’s absolutely delicious!!
You do have to fry for quite a while once tomatoes are added for oil to separate & have a shiny paste !
Love it though thank you
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Thanks for letting me know, Bob!
Thank you so much for this recipe. I had been meaning to try it for ages and last night I went for it.
I am a terrible cook, my Mrs does the vast majority of cooking in our house. I just don’t know what to do so I need very specific instructions – your photos were a big help I must say. However, I didn’t know what heat to cook on so I think I burnt it! 🙂
I know where I fell foul – I couldn’t find the lime juicer so had to slice it up and squeeze it. During this time I could smell burning, so I assume I left it cooking for too long.
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Bummer, Luke. Don’t worry, we’ve all been there with “burning” issue. It’s brave of you to cook a new recipe and I’m sure your results will be even better next time!
Great recipe, such a simple and tasty sauce. I season my meat in tandoori masala spices and yogurt, grill the meat and add at the last moment. GULuess what im cooking tonight!
Hah, glad you’re enjoying it, Richard!
Is it just normal white vinegar or white wine vinegar, I’ve seen recipes that call for one or the other, but I don’t want to assume and get it wrong!
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Hey Kirsty, you can use either. What you’re after is the tanginess the vinegar provides.
Love this Pathia recipe, but how would I go about making extra sauce with this dish for the mopping with naan ? ? Thank you
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Good question, Graeme. I suggest using the same amount of chicken but doubling up on all the other ingredients. Ample sauce!
Great recipe, so simple, yet delicious and make it for the family regularly. My favourite a the moment. Don’t forget the chopped ginger, you can see it in the photos but it is not included in the recipe ingredients.
Nigel
So happy to hear you love the recipe! Thanks for pointing out my ginger error, Nigel. I have updated the recipe accordingly.
Hi Michelle, fantastic recipe… I’ve made this before a while ago and intend to make it again tonight.
My one query is about the onion… I tend to weigh onion then chop, rather than chop and fill cup measurements to find 500ml. Could you guestimate how many grams 500ml of onions is?
Many thanks,
Matt
Thanks for letting me know, Matt.
I think in this case, size matters. 😉 My default answer would be 2 onions but if they’re small, you might need more. Then again, the more onions, the better – for me anyway! Happy cooking!
Perfect recipe! Storecupboard ingredients, what could be better!
I made the base sauce and after the resting step I divided it into two pans, adding diced chicken to one pan and Quorn Pieces to the other, as I don’t eat meat, but my husband does. Worked fantastically. Authentic, just at the right spice level for us. Definitely will make again probably will try prawns next time, as I think the flavour would lend itself perfectly to seafood.
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Thanks Barbara!
You didn’t state at what stage to add the ginger, also, I thought is was way too hot for a pathia. Is there a spice to cut back on to make it less hot/spicy?
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Hi Nick! Thanks for your comment. I like to add ginger at the early stages of the recipe, this way the ginger infuses nicely with other ingredients. You can also add it in the later stage of the cook, however it might not cook all the way through. Best to add it in the beginning in my opinion – it will also cut back on the spice factor. So my suggestion is to ct back on the ginger, black pepper and not to add any chilli. This way, you can enjoy a delicious mild chicken pathia. If you enjoy a small bit of heat, simply add a bit of cayenne pepper. Let me know how this works out for you 🙂
Take out seeds in the chillies
Also a good idea! But, depending on the chilli you can still have some considerable heat
Wow… Super curry, so glad I found this. Just finished it… Very close to my local curry house but fresher and healthier. Thank you so much… New fave curry.
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Thanks Darren!! Enjoy!
Arrrrgghhh… Where’s the recipe gone?
Panicking here…. I am meant to be making this for tea. Please help!
Hi Darren,
Sorry for making you panic. I’m panicking as well that after a major technical update on the website, the recipes have disappeared.
Fret not, if you follow this recipe, you’ll get the same result.
https://www.greedygourmet.com/recipes-for-diets/omnivore/leftover-turkey-curry/
You just need to cook the chicken from raw a little bit longer.
Hoping to sort out this mess soon and thanks so much for alerting me!