'Varutharacha Kozhi Curry' or 'Varutharacha Chicken Curry' or 'Chicken Varutha Curry' all refers the Nadan Kerala style chicken curry prepared using roasted and ground spices and coconut based gravy. This is a flavourful and also a tasty preparation with the roasted flavour. This tasty chicken curry has more gravy when compare to other chicken preparations and the gravy is really tasty with prefect consistency. So you could serve more people and this curry goes well with almost all types of Indian main courses like rice, roti, appam, puttu..etc.

When you prepare this curry your whole apartment could realise the taste and flavour of the curry. You could adjust the spice level by adjusting the red chillies and peppercorns added. Try this chicken curry for this weekend and let me know the results!

Chicken Varutha Curry

Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Cooking Time: 20 minutes
Cuisine: Kerala
Serves: 8-10

INGREDIENTS:
Chicken- 1.2 kg
Pearl onion, cut- 15-20 nos (or)  Onion, chopped- 1 and 1/2
Ginger, chopped/ paste- 1 inch
Garlic, chopped/paste- 4 big cloves
Salt- to taste

To dry roast and grind:
Dry Red chillies, big- 8-10 nos (or) I used Kashmiri chillies-13 nos (adjust according to your spice level)
Coriander seeds-3 tablespoons
Peppercorns- 1/2 teaspoon
Small/ Pearl onions, cut- 15 nos
Coconut, grated- 1/4 cup, tightly packed
Fennel seeds/ Sombu- 1/2 teaspoon
Cinnamon bark- 1 inch, cloves- 3 cardamom-4

To temper:
Oil- 1 tablespoon(use coconut oil for more flavour)
Mustard seeds- 1/2 teaspoon
Curry leaves- 2 strands
Varutha Chicken Curry

PROCEDURE:
  • Clean the chicken and cut them in to medium sized pieces and rinse them using water for 3 times.
  • For the masala dry roast together the red chillies, coriander seeds, peppercorns, cut pearl onions, coconut, fennel seeds, cinnamon, clove and cardamom. Roast on medium flame till you get the coconut golden colour and get the nice roasted aroma of the other spices.
  • Allow to cool and everything on a blender jar and powder well. Now add some water and grind to make a fine paste; set aside.
  • Heat oil in a deep pan and splutter the mustard seeds now add the curry leaves. Add the chopped onion with some salt and cook till it becomes translucent. Add ginger and garlic paste/crushed in pestle and mortar and cook for few minutes till the raw flavour leaves.
  • Add the chicken pieces with salt and mix well. Now add the ground masala paste whole lot and 3-4 cups of water to dilute the curry till you get a thin gravy.
  • Add salt to balance the taste. Allow the gravy to boil well for about 5 minutes.
  • Now reduce the flame and cook for further 5 minutes or more till you get the chicken cooked nice and soft and the curry gets nice taste and flavour and consistency.
  • The curry should not be thick. The good things about this curry is, this preparation has more gravy when compare to other chicken curries and from the gravy the water content will not separate on top when you keep it as such.
  • Note: Health conscious people could use refined oil to prepare this curry. Use coconut oil to get more flavour in nadan Kerala style.
  • In this chicken curry there is no souring agents used as it is a traditional recipe. If you like little sourness in curry add a small tomato after the ginger garlic.
  • I used Kashmiri red chillies for more colour and less spicy curry if you use normal red chillies the colour of the curry will slightly vary.
Kozhi Varutha Curry