Butter Chicken (Murgh Makhani) is one of the most popular curries in the world and yet happens to be one of the easiest! No hunting down hard to find ingredients, this chef recipe that makes the most incredible curry sauce.
This is a reader-favourite recipe included by popular demand in my debut cookbook “Dinner”!
Butter Chicken – a chef recipe!
As someone who loves food with big, BIG flavours, it’s no surprise that Indian is one of my favourite foods. A good curry and binge watching Netflix is pretty much my idea of a perfect Friday night. #NanaAlert! 😂
As much as I love making Indian food at home, sometimes I find the list of ingredients daunting. It’s easy enough to make once I gather all the ingredients, but that’s where I usually fall short because it requires a trip to an Indian grocery store – and my closest one is a fair drive away.
Butter Chicken is one of the few exceptions. I was elated when I discovered a Chef recipe for Butter Chicken and realised how easy it is. But more importantly, you can get all the ingredients from any supermarket. Yes!
Is Butter Chicken really Indian??
YES it is! It’s called Murgh Makhani and it hails from Northern India. It’s quite a mild curry compared to many Indian curries, and outside of India, it’s become just about everybody’s favourite curry!
How to make Butter Chicken – in 3 Simple Steps
Make Butter Chicken Marinade and marinate chicken for 3+ hours (overnight is best)
Cook chicken
Make sauce in the same skillet
The secret to the tender, flavour infused chicken is a spice infused yogurt marinade made with fresh ginger, garlic, lemon juice and spices. The spices in Butter Chicken are turmeric, garam masala, chilli powder and cumin.
Did you know….You don’t need copious amounts of butter for a great Butter Chicken!
The beautiful Butter Chicken Sauce mostly gets its richness from cream. While some restaurants take it over the top by stirring in a (very!) generous amount of butter into the sauce at the end, I find that it’s rich enough as it is. The Butter Chicken flavour and experience – but less oily than restaurant versions!
The sauce will initially be a pale orange colour but as it simmers and thickens, the colour will deepen to a rich orange colour.
What to serve with Butter Chicken
To make a proper Indian feast, sides and starters are essentials! Because every curry needs papadums for dunking and naan to scoop up the sauce with, right?
No-fry quick papadums – just microwave them! Place the papadums around the edge of the microwave turntable and cook on high for 45 seconds to 1 minute or until they are puffed up. They’ll be soft while warm but as soon as they cool down, they crisp up. They don’t expand as much as when deep fried, but neither will your thighs. 😂
Samosas! The ultimate Indian appetiser. Leftovers make great snacks or even lunch!
Proper naan – A recipe in the works for 5 years, I’m thrilled to finally share my proper naan recipe that can be easily made at home (no tandoor needed!)
Shortcut “naan” – For a simpler, no-yeast flatbread that’s just as good, my Easy No Yeast Flatbread looks and tastes very similar to real naan (except it’s much faster and easier!). Try telling me this doesn’t look like it belongs in this feast!
And it’s MADE for dunking in that creamy Butter Chicken Sauce!!
Readers have also asked for Vegetable Side options – to add some greens to a meal. Indian food doesn’t really have fresh side salads like in Western cuisine. Partly because so much Indian food is vegetarian, so you get plenty of veggies in your diet!
But here are some Vegetable Side Options you can add on the side of Butter Chicken:
Indian Tomato Salad – with a refreshing minted yogurt dressing;
Cucumber salad with lemon yogurt dressing – another great refreshing salad that goes perfectly with curries;
Just some sliced cucumber and wedges of tomato – not dressed. Nice cool, refreshing side
South Indian Thoran-style Cabbage and Carrot Salad with Coconut is fresh, crunchy and shot through with gentle spices and coconut!
For a simpler cabbage salad, try my Everyday Cabbage Salad
I hope this has inspired you to try your hand at making an Indian feast at home! You will honestly be amazed how much depth of flavour there is in the Butter Chicken despite how few ingredients are in it. – Nagi x
Watch How To Make It
This is a reader-favourite recipe included by popular demand in my debut cookbook “Dinner”!
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Butter Chicken
Ingredients
Marinade
- 1/2 cup plain yoghurt , full fat
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 1 tsp tumeric powder
- 2 tsp garam masala (Note 1)
- 1/2 tsp chilli powder or cayenne pepper powder (Note 2)
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1 tbsp ginger, freshly grated
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1.5 lb / 750 g chicken thigh fillets, cut into bite size pieces
Curry
- 2 tbsp (30 g) ghee or butter, OR 1 tbsp vegetable oil (Note 3)
- 1 cup tomato passata (aka tomato puree) (Note 4)
- 1 cup heavy / thickened cream (Note 5)
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 1 1/4 tsp salt
To serve – choose
- Basmati rice
- White rice
- Coriander/cilantro (optional)
Instructions
- Optional blitz: for an extra smooth sauce, combine the Marinade ingredients (except the chicken) in a food processor and blend until smooth. (I do not do this)
- Marinade: Combine the Marinade ingredients with the chicken in a bowl. Cover and refrigerate overnight, or up to 24 hours (minimum 3 hrs).
- Cook chicken: Heat the ghee (butter or oil) over high heat in a large fry pan. Take the chicken out of the Marinade but do not wipe or shake off the marinade from the chicken (but don’t pour the Marinade left in the bowl into the fry pan).
- Place chicken in the fry pan and cook for around 3 minutes, or until the chicken is white all over (it doesn’t really brown because of the Marinade).
- Sauce: Add the tomato passata, cream, sugar and salt. Also add any remaining marinade left in the bowl. Turn down to low and simmer for 20 minutes. Do a taste test to see if it needs more salt.
- Garnish with coriander/cilantro leaves if using. Serve with basmati rice.
- The Butter Chicken is pictured with my very easy No Yeast Flatbread and no-fry papadums (Note 5).
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
Originally published July 2015. Updated for housekeeping matters and a new video added January 2019. But most importantly, Life of Dozer section added!
For Indian Curry Lovers
- Chicken Tikka Masala – kind of like Butter Chicken on steroids!
- Palak Paneer – Indian cottage cheese and spinach curry
- Rogan Josh – fall apart lamb in a rich creamy sauce!
- Dal – the highest and best use of lentils, ever. Period.
- Biryani – the world’s best Chicken & Rice. Full stop!
- Qeema: Curried Ground Beef (Mince) – the fastest way ever to get a real Indian curry fix
- Curry lovers, head here -> Curry Collection
Life of Dozer
Flashback: Dozer’s first time in water. Look at those wild eyes!!! 😂 Fear? Excitement??
Nagi! This Butter Chicken was divine! I am an American living in Singapore 9 years now. 20% of our population is Indian so have access to Butter Chicken at many restaurants and even potlucks! This is THE BEST! I’m done looking for another recipe.
Incredibly delicious 😋
Haven’t made this for some time- I had forgotten how tasty and easy to prepare it is – thank you Nagi
A family favourite. xo
Hi Nagi – my butter chicken tasted wonderful and tender / fell apart – but the sauce covering the chicken was nowhere near as thick as in your cookbook photo? I added some cornflour at end to help thicken, but suggestions?
Easiest & yummiest eventho i didn’t get to marinate for 3hrs
Hi we like this recipe but found the sauce a bit intense as described. I blitz half a can of cooked lentils with a can of tomatoes then add the cream, and thin with a bit of liquid (stock or water or wine) to make it a bit mellower. The spice combination is great though & my son loves the fact that it doesn’t include any onions.
Can you substitute paneer for the chicken and follow the recipe the same way?
This is incredible, so simple but followed to the letter it turns out superbly.
So, I made this dish using left over chicken from a Tikki Masala recipe where the sauce was absolutely awful and no one would eat it! I was able to rinse the sauce away and I had this wonderfully seasoned chicken breast pieces left! Who would’ve known? I followed this recipe to the tee for the sauce portion except I went for a quarter cup of butter and wow-wow!! Amazing! The husband didn’t believe me when I told him it was same chicken from the other disk. Night and day difference! Thank you for saving my Indian dish!!
Just cooked your butter chicken and it was awesome. Very easy to do and the best bit was my ultra finicky wife said I can make that again. Praise of the highest order. Keep up the good work.
Fantastic recipe! I subbed coconut milk for regular and it turned out so good!
didnt work for me the ghee we used split as soon as it hit the pan did a stir fry of veg and combined the 2 the next day was much better
Excellent recipe Nagi. Thank you! Easy and delicious.
Could you sub in coconut milk instead of the cream?
Wonderful recipe. Can you freeze it?
I’m wondering the same! The recipe book says not suitable for freezing but I’m wondering why!
I’ve made it a few times and frozen it with rice for lunches. All good taste wise!
I have had great results by preparing through marinade and freezing then finishing recipe. I’ve also froze the completed recipe but can’t personally report as it was sent to stuff my college son’s freezer (3 batches actually and some of Nagi’s Naan frozen.) Excellent reviews from him and his roommates, but not sure how reliable a bunch of hungry college kids are; they’d probably eat cardboard when they were hungry and say it was good. My concern was the cream sauce texture would be impacted (I did simmer the sauce a little longer and surmising when defrosted it might get a little watery) but my son reported it was great.
This is on our fortnightly rotation of curries! We LOVE it!! so easy and tasty!!!
Delish, swapped the chicken for Paneer Cheese and it was fantastic
This Butter Chicken is so good … I’ve been using your recipes for the past few years and I love them all … I made your naan too and it’s so good… thank you so much!!
I had plain greek yogurt with berries for breakfast for years. One day I’d suddenly had enough, so I froze my remaining yogurt in 8oz portions. This makes it so easy to whip this marinade up!
I’ve made this several times and we love it.
Hi Nagi. Firstly, thanks for all your wonderful recipes. I rarely go anywhere else now. It was my first time making butter chicken, however, and I’m just wondering – is it normal for it to look like it’s a bit ‘separated’ ? Followed your recipe to a T. Used ‘Plain Greek Style Yoghurt’. Was that incorrect? Any advice would be gratefully appreciated. Cheers, and thanks again so much for your perfect recipes.