Indian Recipes
Butter Chicken (Murgh Makhani)
Mild, rich and silky: yoghurt-marinated chicken charred under a hot grill, then simmered in a smooth tomato, butter and cashew sauce scented with cardamom, cinnamon and dried fenugreek, and finished with cream.
- Serves 4
- Marinate 2 hrs–overnight
- Cook about 50 min
- Mild
- Indian (Punjabi)
Method
Mix the yoghurt (150 g), lemon juice (½ lemon), chilli powder (2 tsp), garam masala (1 tsp), cumin (1 tsp), turmeric (½ tsp), garlic (3 cloves), ginger (15 g) and salt (1 tsp) in a bowl. Stir in the chicken (750 g) until every piece is coated, cover and chill for at least 2 hours, or overnight for the most tender result.
Heat the grill to its highest setting. Line a grill tray with foil, set a rack on it and brush the rack with a little oil. Lift the chicken out of the marinade, letting the excess drip off, and spread it out on the rack.
Grill the chicken close to the heat for 8–10 minutes, turning once, until it is charred at the edges. It does not need to be cooked through, as it finishes in the sauce. (A barbecue or a very hot ridged griddle pan works too.)
For the sauce, melt half the butter (60 g) with the oil (1 tbsp) in a large pan over a medium heat. Add the cardamom (4 cardamom pods) and cinnamon (1) and let them sizzle for 30 seconds, then add the onion (1 onion) and cook for 8–10 minutes until soft and golden.
Add the garlic (3 cloves), ginger (15 g) and green chilli (1) and cook for 1–2 minutes. Tip in the tomatoes (400 g), tomato purée (1 tbsp), drained cashews (30 g), sugar (1 tsp) and 150 ml of water, then simmer for 15 minutes, stirring now and then, until thick.
Take out the cinnamon stick, cardamom pods and green chilli, then blend the sauce until completely smooth with a stick blender. For a restaurant-smooth finish, push it through a sieve.
Return the sauce to the pan, add the chicken and any juices from the tray and simmer gently for 8–10 minutes until the chicken is cooked through, with no pink in the middle.
Stir in the rest of the butter, the cream (100 ml) and the second measure of garam masala (1 tsp). Crumble in the dried fenugreek leaves (1 tbsp) between your palms, if using. Simmer for 2 minutes, then taste: add salt, a pinch of sugar or a squeeze of lemon to balance.
Serve with a swirl of cream and the coriander leaves (to serve), with basmati rice or naan.
Tip: tap a step to tick it off as you cook.
See also
Chef’s notes
- Kashmiri chilli powder gives the deep red colour without much heat. Ordinary chilli powder is hotter, so start with half the amount and add more to taste.
- Thighs stay juicy; if you prefer breast, grill it for only 6–7 minutes and simmer it in the sauce for 5 minutes.
- No cashews? Use 2 tablespoons of ground almonds, or leave them out and add a little more cream.
- Dried fenugreek leaves (kasuri methi) give the authentic restaurant flavour. Look for them in Indian grocers and the world-food aisle.
- It reheats well and is even better the next day. Keeps 2 days in the fridge or 3 months frozen.
Born in a Delhi tandoor kitchen
Butter chicken is usually credited to the Moti Mahal restaurant in Delhi, founded by Kundan Lal Gujral after Partition in 1947. The story goes that leftover tandoori chicken was simmered in a sauce of tomatoes, butter and cream so it would not dry out.
Its gentle heat and rich sauce made it one of the best-known Indian dishes around the world. The Hindi name, murgh makhani, simply means chicken with butter.
How this recipe was developed
We compared butter chicken by Rick Stein (Rick Stein’s India) and Laxmi Khurana’s yoghurt-marinated chicken tikka with the most-rated versions on NYT Cooking, Serious Eats and BBC Good Food.
- A yoghurt marinade, overnight if possible. Laxmi Khurana marinates her chicken tikka for hours in yoghurt and spices; NYT Cooking and Rick Stein also start with a spiced yoghurt marinade.
- Char the chicken separately. Serious Eats grills the chicken under a fierce heat and Rick Stein chars it before it meets the sauce, for a smoky, tandoor-style flavour. NYT browns it in the pan instead.
- Cashews for body. Serious Eats blends raw cashews into the sauce, BBC Good Food uses cashew butter and Rick Stein a nut paste. They thicken without flour and add richness.
- Whole cardamom and cinnamon. NYT Cooking’s sauce has a cinnamon note; Serious Eats toasts cardamom and clove.
- A smooth, blended sauce. Serious Eats blends the sauce before the chicken goes back in.
- Butter, cream and fenugreek at the end. Rick Stein and Serious Eats finish with dried fenugreek leaves; every version finishes with butter and cream.
Sources we compared (ratings as shown on each site on 31 October 2026):
- Rick Stein: Butter Chicken (Rick Stein's India), The Happy Foodie reproduction
- Laxmi Khurana: Chicken Tikka (An Indian Housewife's Recipe Book), Bookey chapter summary
- NYT Cooking (Sam Sifton (adapted from Amandeep Sharma)): Butter Chicken (5/5, 12,034 ratings)
- Serious Eats (Sho Spaeth): Butter Chicken (stovetop) (4.4/5, 23 ratings)
- BBC Good Food (Miriam Nice): Butter chicken (4/5, 33 ratings)
This is an original Cookeryonline recipe written in our own words. Ingredient choices and techniques are credited above; no source text has been copied.