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Madras Chicken Curry

A spicy chicken curry made with coriander, mustard, cumin, poppy seeds, turmeric, chillies, garlic, ginger, coconut, onion, and ghee.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Cumin and turmeric match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,698 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Madras Chicken Curry

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the paste

  1. Grind the coriander, mustard seeds, cumin, poppy seeds, turmeric, dry red chillies, garlic, ginger, coconut, and medium onion finely into a paste with some water.

Cook the curry

  1. Heat ghee in a pot over medium heat until boiling hot.

  2. Add the sliced onion and fry until light brown.

  3. Stir in the ground paste and fry until the smell disappears.

  4. Add the cut-up chicken and fry, covering and uncovering the pot alternately until the water is absorbed.

  5. Add salt to taste and pour in enough water to cover the chicken.

  6. Cook on low heat until the chicken is tender and the ghee appears on the surface.

Serve

  1. Serve with boiled rice or bread, and add lime juice or coconut milk for extra flavor if desired.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Cumin + turmerictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,698 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Coriander + cumintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,866 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Turmeric + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Coriander + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main protein, which becomes tender during the long, gentle simmer.
Ghee
Carries the spices' flavor and gives the sauce richness as it fries the paste.
Coconut
Adds body and a mild sweetness that rounds out the spice paste.
Onion
Fried until light brown, it adds sweetness and thickens the sauce as it softens.
Garlic
Contributes pungent aroma that deepens as it cooks in the paste.

The step that matters

Frying the ground paste until the smell disappears. Frying raw spice paste in fat cooks off its raw, harsh edge and releases aromatic compounds. Stopping too early leaves the curry tasting raw and dusty.

Swap the poppy seed

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (coriander, mustard, cumin, turmeric, clove, garlic, ginger):

  1. Cardamomfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Oreganofits better
  4. Poppy seedthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against coriander, mustard, cumin, turmeric, clove, garlic, ginger. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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