Affordable, healthy butter chicken
Nothing beats a hearty butter chicken on a cooler day, now that we are coming into autumn I am loving making nourishing curries, hearty stews, warm pasta dishes and sweet potato cottage pies.
This curry recipe is healthy, contains less calories than your usual butter chicken, and is super affordable to make. You can serve it to a family or group of 4 , or have it for yourself and freeze the rest as it freezes and unfreezes well, making meals on those busier nights easier for you.
Changes you can make to the recipe to suit your needs:
- If you don't eat meat you can substitute the chicken for chickpeas or a plant based chicken substitute.
- If you are dairy free use coconut cream/milk or coconut natural yoghurt instead of greek (these options are slightly higher in calories).
- If you need a lower calorie meal to fit into your daily macros (to suit you and your individual self) then swap out the brown rice with cauliflower rice. (100g of cauliflower rice = 27 calories)
- You can also combine the chicken with chickpeas, for example 250g of chicken and 1 can of chickpeas instead of 400g of chicken.
-Please note that the macro breakdown below is for the recipe made with chicken.
THE RECIPE:
INGREDIENTS:
Spices:
1 tablespoon of gram masala
1 teaspoon of ground coriander seed
1/2 a teaspoon of cumin
1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger
1/8 - 1/4 of a teaspoon of cayenne (depending on how spicy you want to make it)
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of cracked pepper
Everything else:
400g of boneless, skinless chicken breast
1 1/2 cups of greek yoghurt
1 brown onion (diced)
5 cloves of garlic (minced)
3 tablespoons of butter (or a dairy free alternative)
1 can of chopped tomatoes
1/4 cup of tomato paste
1 cup of spinach
1/2 a cauliflower
Brown rice (60g per person)
Optional:
- Buckwheat naan bread to serve (included in macro break down)
(recipe provided in a different blog post)
THE METHOD:
1. In a large bowl stir half a cup of your greek yoghurt, salt, cracked pepper together until combined.
2. Place diced chicken or meat alternative into the yoghurt and mix until the chicken or alternative is well coated. Before you cook your chicken, bring a pot of salted water to the boil to cook your rice.
3. Cook the chicken in a pan for a few minutes using 1 teaspoon of olive oil, if you do not have a non stick pan and cook until golden brown. Ensure you give the chicken chunks room in the pan, you do not want to over crowd your pan.
4. Take the chicken out of the pan and place to the side. Put the rice on.
5. In your pan place 1 tablespoon of butter, diced onion, minced garlic, and all your spices. Cook all of this for a couple of minutes until the aromatics of the spices start to release.
6. Add chopped tomatoes, tomato paste, 1 cup of greek yoghurt, and stir into the onion, garlic and spices.
7. After 1-2 minutes, add the chicken or alternative into the sauce, as well as the chopped cauliflower. Add the rest of your butter.
8. Stir gently and bring to a simmer for at least 15 minutes.
9. Once your sauce starts to thicken you can take it off the heat and add in 1 cup of spinach.
10. Serve with 60g of cooked brown rice per person or 100g of cauliflower rice.
I served my curry with some fresh slices of cucumber, it was a nice balance with the heat of this dish.
Serves 4
Macros: (with buckwheat naan)
P: 49g | C: 29g | F: 19g
Calories with rice: 640 per serve
Calories with cauliflower rice: 530 per serve
Macros for brown rice:
P: 2.4g | C: 20g | F: 1.5g
Cost per serve:
$18.29NZD for the whole dish served with brown rice and buckwheat naan
$4.60NZD per person to serve 4
This dish would be $11.29NZD for the whole dish if made with chickpeas instead of chicken bringing the cost down to $2.80 per person to serve 4.
Enjoy and I look forward to seeing your creations on social media, don't forget to tag me @pt_with_renee #pwrmeals
If you need further help or advice with your nutrition or calorie requirements then get in touch with me today, to see how I can help you with achieving your goals.
Renee xx