Tikka Masala
Tikka masala earns its reputation in two stages, and the first one asks for about ninety seconds of your attention.
Chicken goes into yogurt with a couple of teaspoons of the blend, then sits in the fridge while you get on with your evening. Yogurt treats meat more gently than a citrus or vinegar marinade does, tenderizing without pushing the texture toward chalky, and it carries the spice into the chicken rather than leaving it sitting on the outside.
Twenty minutes does something. Overnight does more.
Then the sauce, which runs brighter and tangier than its butter chicken sibling. Tomato and citric acid land first, cumin and ginger fill in behind them, and the cayenne arrives a few bites later as warmth rather than heat. The Tikka Masala spice packet holds all of it, measured, with Chef Meherwan Irani's recipe printed on the back. You bring the chicken, yogurt, an onion, a can of crushed tomatoes, and cream. Thirty minutes after you open the packet, four people are eating.
Here's how it comes together.
This recipe uses one entire Tikka Masala spice packet.
