Chicken pathia. Like they make in the best restaurants. Hotel style. Spicy. Sweet. Sour. A little magic in every bite.
Chatpata. That’s a word I didn’t know. Learned it watching Chef’s Table. Gaggan Anand.
Four elements in harmony. Sweet, sour, salty and spicy in perfect balance. Indian umami.
That describes chicken pathia perfectly. Like textbook perfect. Maybe it should be called chicken chatpata.
He’s talking about it at his level. And his level is so far above mine it’s not even worth measuring.The concept is eye opening though. Brings focus.
Chatpata. Something to be thinking about. Something to strive for.
Madras’ misunderstood cousin
That’s how I think of chicken pathia. My version anyway. A little like a chicken Madras. But not really.
It’s sweet. And it’s sour. A little sugar. A little tamarind sauce. Sort of Madras spicing. That’s it really. Familiar. But different.
Somehow that sweet and sour tweak changes everything. Makes pathia it’s own dish. Amazing how a couple extra ingredients can change everything.
Chicken pathia is a simple dish. Not a lot of ingredients. No whole spices. No pastes to make. Just a few simple spices. Some hotel gravy. Chicken. Tamarind sauce.
It’s almost too simple. Unworthy you might think. Except it’s not. Absolutely not. That’s the beauty of chicken pathia. Simple. Straight forward. And yet complex.
Sometimes simple can be amazing. This is one of those times.
Hotel style chicken pathia
This is not takeaway style. Not regular restaurant style. This is about kicking it up a notch. Four notches really.
Hotel style. Fine Indian restaurant style. What the really good Indian restaurants are doing.
Restaurants putting food quality first. The ones that aren’t trying to make a $12 curry. Going for gold. The kind of restaurant I want to eat at.
There are two restaurant based approaches on Glebekitchen. High end and mainstream. Horses for courses.
Restaurant style is what they do at most restaurants. Takeaways. Simple. Fast. And tasty. It relies on a single gravy. Restaurant curry base. One size fits all.
Hotel style is high end restaurant approach. More disciplined. The right tool for job. Different gravies for different dishes. Blending gravies even. It changes the game. And I’m really excited about it.
Think French. Mother sauces. That’s what this is. But applied to Indian cooking. Heavy on the prep. But so worth it. Big tastes. The kind of depth of flavour you can’t get any other way.
It’s a bit of curry magic I think. Not Gaggan magic. Not even close. But for us mere mortals…
All that great chicken flavour
The other big difference is how the chicken is prepared. And it is a big difference.
Takeaway restaurant style relies on pre-cooked chicken. It’s faster. It’s easier. And it’s probably safer. But it comes at a price.
And that price is chicken flavour. Hotel style is a different approach. The chicken goes in raw. You have to pay attention not to overcook it. But you get the juices as it cooks.
And those juices are delicious. Losing them was probably my single biggest problem with takeaway restaurant style. I feel better now. Simple things make me happy.
Tamarind sauce is important
This recipe is pretty specific. Tamarind sauce. Not tamarind paste. And definitely not tamarind concentrate.
Tamarind sauce is like ketchup. A condiment. Not actually like ketchup. But in a bottle. Pre-fab. Commercial product. Papadum dip in a jar.
A little sweet. And sour. A little spicy. And a little salty. See where I’m going? Chatpata in a bottle.
I like it. A lot. There’s something about it. Works well in a dhansak. In this dish. On eggs. In sandwiches.
I’m not shilling. I don’t take bribes. Don’t do sponsored posts. I just really like Maggi Tamarina. It’s perfect for this dish.
It’s like fight club. First rule. Nobody talks about Maggi Tamarina. But there’s probably a bottle in an Indian restaurant kitchen near you. I bet they love it too.
Chicken pathia done hotel style
Ready to expand your horizons? Give this one a go. It’s definitely one you need to try.
Chicken pathia isn’t the most famous curry out there. Probably not in the top 10. Or even the top 20.
It has lost the popularity contest. And that’s too bad. Because it has it all. Sweet. Sour. Spicy. Salty.
Chatpata.
You had to know I would finish with that…
chicken pathia curry
Ingredients
The spice mix
- 1 1/2 tsp hot madras curry powder – you can get this at just about any Indian grocer
- 2 tsp kashmiri chili powder
- 1 /2 tsp coriander powder
- 1/2 tsp cumin powder
- 1/2 tsp turmeric powder
- 1/2 tsp kasoor methi – dried fenugreek leaves
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt – a bit less if you use regular table salt
Pathia chicken curry
- 3 tbsp vegetable oil – any neutral oil works
- 1 tbsp garlic ginger paste
- 1 cup Indian hotel curry gravy – recipe link below
- 3 boneless, skinless chicken thighs – cut into 3-4 pieces each
- 1 tbsp tamarind sauce – Not paste. Not concentrate. Sauce. Sweet and sour tamarind sauce. I like Maggi Tamarina. See note.
- 1 tsp jaggery or brown sugar
- 2-4 Tbsp water or chicken stock. Depends how saucy you like your curry.
Instructions
Do your prep
- This goes fast. Be ready. Make your spice mix. Combine the powdered spices in a small bowl. Get your ingredients out and close to the stove.
Make the pathia chicken curry
- Heat the oil in a medium frying pan until it just starts to shimmer.
- Stir in the garlic ginger paste. Cook until the garlic ginger paste stops sputtering.
- Turn your heat to medium low and add your spice mix. Gently fry the spices for 30-45 seconds. This is why you added a full 3 tablespoons of oil at the beginning. Spices fried in oil. Bloomed spices. This is where the magic happens. Too little oil and the spices will stick or burn and you will be starting over.
- Turn the heat up to medium. Add the Indian hotel curry gravy. Bring it to a simmer. Really stir it to get the oil to combine. Cook for about a minute. You don't need it to fry like a regular restaurant curry. That's the beauty of hotel style. That step is done before you start cooking the final dish. No need to make a mess of your stove.
- Add the chicken in an even layer and cover the pan. After about 5 minutes flip the chicken pieces. Tongs are good for this. Can't beat a good set of restaurant tongs in the kitchen. Cover again and cook until the chicken is just done.
- The chicken should take around 8-12 minutes to cook through. It really depends on how large the chicken thigh pieces are. Best bet is to use an instant read thermometer and go for a 170F internal temperature.
- Once the chicken is done, stir in the tamarind sauce and the sugar. Simmer for about a minute.
- The texture should be about right at this point. If it's too thick add a bit of water or chicken stock Not a lot. Probably a couple tablespoons max. More if you like it really saucy.
- If it is too thin (chicken throws a fair bit of liquid as it cooks) just let the curry simmer uncovered for a minute or two.
- I love this curry with chapatis and rice and just about any side. Tarka dal. Chana. Dal palak. Whatever you like will work. Except ice cream. Ice cream will not work…
You cover cook for 5 then flip … do you cover again ? As it does not say after the flip
Yes. Updated the recipe – thanks.
Dear Romain, last week my son asked me – nearly begging – to make another glebekitchen curry. And he was completely correct, it was too long ago! So we chose together, and decided to make this one. Absolutely yummy, although it looked darker on the pictures than in my pan. Next time I will try to make the gravy darker. However, it was extremely delicious, and the kids were immediately hoping for leftovers for the day after. We had it together with Easy Chana Masala and Pilau rice, perfect match of course! And that Maggi Tamarind Sauce is amazing, luckily it is available over here. Another glebekitchen hit, we loved it! All the best from The Hague, Daniel and family.
Sounds like a serious feast. I do love the Tamarina in this dish. A secret ingredient:-)
Hello Romain I always prepare Indian dishes when I am hosting friends, simply due to the fact that they are sssssoooooooo good. I am wondering if I am able to cook some dishes the day before as I do not want to take time away from the group. Here is my planned menu
Chole Masala,Keema Lamb,Aloo Keema and Chicken Pathia and of course rice.
Will a day ahead make much difference? And if any which would be more advisable to cook on the day?
As always I enjoy your site immensely
Yes, just gently reheat in a saucepan before serving or better yet, take the recipe to the point just before adding the protein and finish the dish off right before dinner. That depends on the dish of course. Some will benefit from that approach more than others (hotel style the most).
As you say, Pathia is Madras’ misunderstood cousin. It’s always been one of my favourites, particularly with prawns (or shrimp, depending on what you call them where you are). Chicken is also very nice.
I made this tonight with some of your latest “simple dal” on the side with plain Basmati rice and some nan bread.
A dinner truly fit for a king!
Delighted you enjoyed it. Two of my favourite dishes in one meal. Wish I’d been there!
Hi, in this recipe does the hotel curry gravy need to be pre heated, thanks, Dave
Not at all. Just forget everything you know about cooking restaurant style and go with the flow. You will wind up somewhere good.
Made this this evening. After making the base. I think my fiancé is a bit disturbed that I can make something so tasty. Like… I’m serious. Weird. But good god is this delicious.
That may be the best comment this year:-)
Made this with my friend Michelle for my sister, who’s entertaining guests next week. It was an unplanned curry after making her a tikka masala and madras but whoa! This one is my new favourite – lovely complex flavour, sweet and spicy with a nice bit of tamarind tang. She’s doing it with king prawns. I’ve shared this site with everyone I know who loves curry – this is THE best curry site online, great work Romain.
I’m delighted to hear you are enjoying the recipes. I’m a big fan of this one too. Pathia is under-rated IMO.
We make a great team Jools. Looking forward to our girly curry night, making a few of Romain’s recipes.
Have fun!!!
So, so happy to find this post. The pathia is the forgotten one. It’s always my go-to at my favourite restaurant, but almost all of my Indian friends have never heard of it either (originally Persian? Gujarati?). Like you say, it’s the unbeatable sweet, sour and salty heaven. And once the hotel gravy is done, it’s a 10-minute treat!
Delighted you found the post. It is one of the truly great dishes. An unsung hero.
I told you & I’ll tell you again, your recipes have been a game changer.
What an absolute cracker!
I do start to enjoy playing up with different techniques (heat related) and spices to adapt it to my taste.
But something is missing man!
A good ol’ Glebe Kitchen style naan recipe!!!!
Everything I’ve tried so far is nowhere near your curries standard (never as fluffy as I can get at my local curry house) and bring the whole experience down.
Any chance we could get one of Romain’s special naan bread recipe? Cheers,
You will have it as soon as I figure it out! I am more of a paratha guy but a good naan is a wonderful thing so I need to get going on that.
Looking forward to trying this one! Is it alright to pre-cook the chicken using your chicken tikka method from the naga chicken recipe? I’m such a fan of that!
That will work. It will change the flavour profile a bit but it will be tasty. The only thing to keep in mind is you need to make up the liquid that would have otherwise come from the chicken juices.
This curry turned out amazing, I love cooking the chicken in the pan rather than precooked chicken. I loved this Curry, thank you for the recipe another delicious curry recipe. I think the best so far and the flavor of the sweet and sour was very yummy.
It’s an under-rated dish. So happy to hear you enjoyed it!
Hi Romain,
Delicious, as always. My family’s enjoying the addition of tamarind in many of your recipes. I think I screwed up, though – I made the Madras curry powder myself (by combining 1 tsp Kashmiri chili powder, 1/2 tsp fenugreek leaves, and 1/2 tsp kosher salt) and then added the spices & salt you list. This was too salty for me – what did I do wrong? As I said previously, Delicious, but a bit too salty.
Regards,
Allison from NY
You doubled the salt? Madras curry powder is a blend of a lot more of those three ingredients and there is nowhere near that much salt in the brands I use.
Another cracker Romain. Thank you. Can’t wait to try it.
Your blog is amazing. Every write up puts a smile on my face. Excellent dry wit. You could be a chef or a comedian…or both!
Thank you. Delighted to hear that and that you are enjoying the blog. I try to keep things fun here.
Why has dopiaza got so sweet these days, yet the onions are not cooked down to provide sweetness.
I don’t know. That’s a function of popular preference and what restaurants are doing I guess. It’s not meant to be a particularly sweet dish. Certainly the dopiaza recipes on glebekitchen are not sweet.
Chicken is good, yum, but my absolute favourite (in a restaurant at least) is lamb pathia (aloo, or with potato). Do you reckon this recipe would work with that ? OK, so you can’t really cook lamb like that from raw unless it was in pretty thin slices…but all the same ..
That’s just a little tweak. You can just pre-cook the lamb in a little seasoned stock or water and then proceed with the recipe. You will need to add a bit of stock to thin the sauce to your desired consistency as you won’t have the liquid thrown by the chicken if you go this route. See the hotel lamb madras for more detail.
Thanks Romain
Another one to try out, may leave out the sugar as the Tamarind sauce already has some in. We gave up on takeaways due to them having too much sugar in.
Keep up the good work
Leave the sugar out until the very end and taste. I have no sweet tooth whatsoever (check my list of zero desserts on this blog as an indicator:-) so nothing is particularly sweet in my kitchen.
It must be possible to make a tamarind sauce from tamarind concentrate? How about a tsp of jaggery and 1/4 tsp tamarind concentrate?
That would be a weak approximation. It would cover sweet and sour but not salty or spicy. I will come up with something someday I hope. But for now I can’t beat the bottled stuff. You could try concentrate, water and sugar until it is in balance if you can’t get the sauce.