Just cos you’re vegan, it doesn’t mean you have to give up on guilty pleasures like a delicious, restaurant style (vegan) butter chicken.
It feels silly to call this a vegan ‘butter chicken’ recipe since it doesn’t even contain the two main ingredients. But, it’s the best way to describe the rich, tomato-ey, creaminess that this recipe brings to the table.
Butter chicken isn’t really one of those recipes made in an Indian home kitchen. It’s more a dish you have at an Indian restaurant. So in creating this recipe, I didn’t have any family recipes to lean on like I usually do with the Indian food I make.
While researching to see what ingredients would work best as substitutes, I came across a few that sounded downright wrong. One recipe said to use soy sauce among other things. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t physically recoil at that suggestion. I couldn’t think of anything worse, so please guys, don’t use soy sauce in your butter chicken!
Get maximum flavour
I’ve used wheat chunks (i.e seitan) here as the meat replacement but feel free to substitute with tofu, cauliflower or whatever else you fancy. You could even use actual chicken with this vegan butter chicken recipe (haha) as it also works as a healthier alternative to a traditional butter chicken recipe. Which as the name suggests, uses a lot of butter!
The key here is to use a full fat coconut milk (or you won’t get the ‘creaminess’) and to be patient and let the sauce reduce down. Do those two things and you’ve got yourself a finger licking meal.
If you’re feeling adventurous in the kitchen, try making your own garam masala to use in this recipe. I’ve got a quick and easy recipe for homemade garam masala right here.
Hope you enjoy this recipe! And if you gave it a go, let me know what you thought of it in the comments below.
Ingredients
For the marinade:
- 2cm ginger
- 4 garlic cloves
- 2 tsp garam masala
- 1 tsp red chilli
- 1 tsp tumeric
- 500g wheat chunks (i.e seitan - you can sub with whatever you fancy)
Rest of the ingredients:
- 4 tbsp oil
- 1 onion
- 1 green chilli
- 1 tsp sugar
- 700g pasata
- 1/4 cup vegetable stock
- 1 tsp garam masala
- 1 tsp red chilli
- 2 tbsp white malt vinegar (or 1 tbsp white vinegar)
- 200ml full cream coconut milk
- Fresh herbs for garnish
- Salt to taste
Method
- Grind ginger and garlic into a paste. Marinade the wheat chunks with the paste and spices (garam masala, tumeric, chilli powder). Set aside for 15 mins.
- Fry up wheat chunks in 2 tbsp of oil. Once brown around the edges remove from the pan.
- In the same pan, fry up onions and chilli till they start to brown. Add garam masala, red chilli and passata and mix.
- Add vegetable broth and reduce the sauce down.
- Once sauce has reduced, add coconut milk, vinegar and sugar and stir. Allow to simmer for a couple of minutes.
- Add wheat chunks, mix to combine flavours.
- Done! Serve with naan or rice.