Chicken Tikka on a stick

***Edit: please take note of the tikka/tandoori recipe again as I forgot to add salt into the ingredients... whooops! Your meat might be tasteless without good ol' salt!

Frankly, i don't know the difference between chicken tikka and chicken tandoori. But I craved it after I saw pictures of it at TFP's blog. So, i've decided to make some myself - two versions; a vegetarian one and a chicken one.

I'm going to just share with you the recipe in making the marinate for chicken tikka/tandoori. The deep red sauce that's so good, you can use it on almost anything and then bbq or oven baked or grilled. I will include a vegetarian "meat" recipe i used as well and as for the chicken tikka, just use chicken breast pieces chopped up in chunks and just marinate with the marinade.

The Marinade:
1 inch knob of fresh ginger
3 cloves of garlic
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 teaspoon coriander seeds
2 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 tablespoon red curry powder
1 tablespoon paprika powder
1 cup plain yoghurt, the fresher the better
2 tbsp tomato paste
2 teaspoon salt

Method:
1. Put the first 7 ingredients into a mortar and pestle; bruise and grind until the seeds are crushed.
2. Add yoghurt and tomato paste, mix with a spoon.
3. Take it off the mortar and pestle, cover until it's ready to use.

vegetarian tikka

Vegetarian "meat" ingredients:
1/2 cup of mock chicken meat (you can use vegetarian sausage filling too)
2 tablespoons of flour
1 teaspoon of corn flour
2 tablespoon water (add more until u can shape the mixture into a dumpling)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon cumin powder
1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder

Oil for pan frying.

Method:
1. Mix all the ingredients above until you get a thick but shapeable paste.
2. Heat pan with oil (enough to cover half the pan).
3. Using a tablespoon, shape the paste into ping pong size balls and pan fry until it is brown on all sides and it retains a nice imperfect ball shape.
4. Slot them out with a metal sieve on kitchen towels to soak extra oil out.
5. Marinate them with the marinade above for 1 hour.

the REAL chicken tikka :P

I'm going to skewer them on a stick, so for the veggie portion of the meal I might as well skewer the veggies together. So, I used tomatoes, green peppers, eggplant and onions. You can use whatever veggies you like, of course but use a bit of common sense - green lettuce and string beans would not go well as a skewered veggie on a stick, for example. You want something that holds well.

Eat this with basmati rice or coconut rice with a side of vegetable pickles.

Try this easy pickle recipe:
1 cucumber, de-seeded and sliced crossways
1 medium carrot, sliced
1 small can of pineapples
3 tablespoon clear vinegar
2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoon sugar

Method:
1. mix everything together in one bowl and keep refridgerated until ready to use.

The pickle goes very well with the rice and the skewers. And it's especially refreshing when it's getting warmer and warmer these day :)