Sweet Red Pepper Chicken Curry
Sweet Red Pepper Chicken Curry
My fascination with all things Indian is no secret. I find the sights, the sounds and the smells hypnotic. My obsession also embraces the food which is as vibrant and varied as the streets of Mumbai.
Brisbane’s hot and humid weather has put me into an Indian groove.
Recently I’d been flicking through a well worn curry splattered copy of Madhur Jaffrey’s Illustrated Indian Cookery from 1982. I remember buying this book as if it was yesterday. Charmaine Solomon had whet my appetite for Indian food, and this small book helped me continue the delicious journey.
With this recipe I was keen to replicate a previously unexplored idea of Jaffrey’s, a curry paste with aromatics and ground spices pureed into the flesh of a red capsicum. This process creates a simple cook-in sauce. Sweet red peppers are at their very best right now plump, fleshy and cheap, so the time was ripe.
Following a recipe verbatim is a difficulty for me, I can’t help but taste, tweak, alter and adjust. My recipe was definitely inspired by Madhur Jaffrey’s “ lal masale wali murgh.” My Sweet Red Pepper Chicken Curry was absolutely delicious.
Click on the links below for a range of Indian vegetable dishes to serve beside this chicken curry and create an Indian feast.
Sweet Red Pepper Chicken Curry serves 4
4 chicken Marylands, leg and thigh separated and skinned
3 cm piece of root ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
30 g ground blanched almonds
1 large fleshy red pepper about 350g trimmed, deseeded and coarsely chopped
1 tablespoon ground cumin
2 teaspoons ground coriander
1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
1 teaspoon crushed dried chilli
1 teaspoons sea salt flakes
2 tablespoons garlic infused oil
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 roma tomatoes. roughly chopped
1/2 cup water
extra sea salt flakes
very generous grinding of black pepper
2 tablespoons thick yoghurt, whisked until smooth
1/4 cup coriander leaves, roughly chopped
Put the ginger, almonds, red pepper, spices and salt into the jug of your food processor.
Process the ingredients into a fine paste.
Heat the oils in a wide pan with a fitting lid, add the spice paste and cook, stirring frequently until the oil begins to bubble away from the sauce at the edges.
Add the tomatoes and water, stir to combine then add the chicken pieces.
Bring the mixture to the boil, cover and simmer for 25 minutes, turning the chicken in the sauce from time to time.
Remove the chicken pieces and increase the heat under the sauce and reduce to thicken.
Stir in the yoghurt then return the chicken pieces to the pan.
Reheat without boiling.
Scatter over the coriander and serve.
Suggested accompaniments
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22 comments on “Sweet Red Pepper Chicken Curry”
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Please Pass the Recipe by Sandra Gay is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.
Please Pass the Recipe 
This recipe is definitely a keeper to return to. I made it pretty much as written with the only change being subbing a can of chopped tomatoes for fresh. Beautifully balanced flavours in the sauce, which I’m going to try with a firm fleshed fish next time.
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I’m so please you enjoyed this curry ellemm, I think it will be equally delicious made with fish
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Madhur Jaffrey is such a renaissance woman: a film actress, a cookbook writer, and author of a wonderful memoir. The aroma of curry is still all over my house (and in my hair) because I used it in a rice dish last night, but I just winged the preparation and put in what I thought would work. It’s time to try a real recipe: making a paste from bell peppers sounds like a great idea, though I might use them from a jar as they aren’t in season here at all.
best… mae at maefood.blogspot.com
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Hi Mae, fellow curry love and Jaffrey fan. Have you read her autobiography, Climbing the Mango Trees? Peppers from a jar would work week in this recipe, it”s the flavour you want.
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My thoughts immediately went to some leftover ajvar I have. Wonder if this could be incorporated into something resembling this dish? Completely inauthentic, but perhaps equally delicious. I do like the idea of a sweet pepper paste with chicken.
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Go for it Debi, creating delicious food with what you have at hand is how all good recipes evolve
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Hahaha, I understand the need for a regular curry fix too, but sadly none worth eating locally except at my place, homemade. This is simple and delicious
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(huge smile) I have been deliciously married for most of my adult life . . . for my first husband of more than a couple of decades a few times a week, but wonderfully differing, sufficed . . . my second ‘needed’ at least one such every day and was hugely talented in preparing such himself. Mostly Indian, Sri Lankan, Bangladeshi and Pakistani tho’ I love Malaysian and even Burmese . . . No – they were better chefs than I and there were and are wonderful ‘curry’ restaurants in Sydney and beyond. After getting to know the more than 23 countries to prepare ‘curries’ why eat anything else ::) !! . . . .Shall make yours . . .
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Sounds delicious Sandra…have just printed the recipe!
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Definitely a keeper recipe Ardys, quick and delicious
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Love a good curry recipe. This sounds delicious- the sauce enriched by the almonds. Might try it with some fish.
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It think it would work well with seafood of any sort Francesca thanks to the sweetness of the red pepper.
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Yum! Definitely one to try soon!
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Quick and easy Kate but best of all delicious
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Right, chicken and capsicums on the shopping list! The rest I have.
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Nice !!
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Thanks..
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Can’t wait to try this but could you fill in a Canadian cook as to what you mean by Maryland chicken 🐔?
Love you posts,
Janet
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Oh sorry Janet and thanks. The crazy regional terms are never ending. A chicken Maryland is the thigh with leg attached. I have no idea how it got that name.
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I had the same question in mind, so thanks for clarifying.
The dish looks delicious!
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Thanks for that. Definitely going to make it!
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