Friday, 22 March 2013

Chicken Sukka

This dish is close to my heart. CHICKEN SUKKA…the first dish I learnt to cook perfectly from my mom, about 2 years ago. Its from the down south of Tamil Nadu, my native Sivakasi. Its a must have in every hotel there, and they serve a mutton or lamb version of this. Small chunks of lamb in a spicy sauce with lots of oil. Just fab. And I did make a couple of changes to my mom’s version by adding cloves of garlic. This I adapted from my mom’s mutton keema recipe where she cooks minced lamb in a similar sauce with lots and lots of whole garlic cloves. Sukka basically means ‘dry’, the onions you add to the dish makes the difference. If you add less, the chicken turns dry in the end. Bit more of chopped onions will give gravy to the dish.

A very simple dish to make, the sweetness from the caramelized onions, garlicky flavour and the touch of freshly ground cumin and peppercorns….Just Yum…. 



You Will Need:

A kg of Chicken On Bone
10 Garlic Cloves
1 tsp Fennel Seeds 
½ tsp Cumin Seeds
A Cup of Chopped Shallots
4 – 5 Dried Red Chillies
1/2 tsp Turmeric Powder 
A tsp of Homemade Chilli Powder
Tsp of Cumin Powder
Few Curry leaves
4 tbsp Gingelly Oil
1/4 tsp Ground Peppercorns (Optional)
Salt to taste

The Cooking:


Heat oil in a wok and add fennel, cumin, curry leaves and dried red chillies.

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One they crackle, add the chopped onions and garlic cloves and sauté till they turn deep golden brown. 

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Then tip in the washed chicken, stir and add the turmeric, chilli powder and salt.

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Give it a nice mix and cook for couple of min covered. This will help the spices to stick to the chicken. Add required water and cook covered on medium high stirring every few mins.

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Now the quantity of water needed for the chicken I just eyeball it. What I do is, I pour in the water till it comes almost to the top covering the chicken. That's how I measure it. Let the chicken cook till tender and oil starts oozing out of the sukka.

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The onions will make a nice sweet gravy and this is the stage you need to decide the consistency of the gravy you want. If you want them really dry, keep stirring the chicken on high heat for few more min. Sprinkle the cumin powder and give it a nice mix.

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Well, its done.  And if you want it more spicy sprinkle little ground peppercorn, stir and take off heat.


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