Chicken Dhansak Recipe

Dhansak is an Indian dish that’s popular among the Parsi community (a community originally from Persia, present day Iran). In Parsi homes, a dhansak meal is traditionally made on Sundays as it can take a long time to prepare.

Traditionally, the Parsi people would use pumpkins or something similar (butternut squash for example) to sweeten the flavour of the dish, but many recipes (including this one) use fruit juice.

Serves 4, ready in 1 hour.

Ingredients:

4 chicken breasts, 300ml chicken stock, 200ml pure pineapple juice, 100ml mango chutney, 5 onions, 2 garlic cloves, fennel seeds, 50ml natural yogurt, ginger puree, tomato puree, 400g lentils, turmeric powder, mild curry powder, chilli powder, garam masala powder, fresh coriander leaves

Method:

1. To begin, make the onion puree. To do this simply peel and chop 3 onions into small pieces and add to a small pan of boiling water. When you are happy that the onions are soft remove the pieces from the water and blend them into a puree.

2. Follow the same method above with the lentils to make the lentil puree.

3. Next place a large saucepan over a high heat and add a teaspoon of fennel seeds. Heat them until they start to crackle. Add a tablespoon of oil to the pan, peel and chop the remaining onions and add them to the pan. Reduce the temperature to a low heat and cook the onions slowly until they are brown.

4. Now make the curry paste – do this by adding 4 teaspoons of the curry powder, 2 teaspoons of turmeric powder and 1 teaspoon of chili powder into a little bowl along with a little bit of water. Then crush in the garlic cloves (no need to peel the skin) and grate in a little ginger to really get the flavours going!

5. Cut the chicken into 1/2″ cubes. Add the paste to the pan and heat through, and then add the chicken in. Make sure the chicken is well coated in the curry paste.

6. Cook the chicken in the pan for a few minutes, and then pour in the pineapple juice. Then stir in the mango chutney.

7. Now, in a second bowl, pour the yoghurt in, and put 2 tablespoons of tomato puree and all the onion and lentil puree, and mix in the bowl.

8. Add the chicken stock to the saucepan and turn up the heat bringing it to a simmer. Pour in the yoghurt mixture and leave for around 15 minutes, stirring every few minutes.

9. After the time is up add a couple of teaspoons of garam masala and give it a final stir. Allow it another couple of minutes.

10. Serve on warm plates with rice and naan bread, and garnish with roughly chopped coriander leaves.

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