Our Burmese Indian style chicken curry recipe makes a rich curry fragrant with ginger, turmeric, garlic and chilli that has a homemade Burmese curry powder on its concise list of ingredients. It’s the perfect accompaniment to Burmese coconut rice and the refreshing salads of Myanmar that provide contrasting textures and flavours, such as the Burmese raw cabbage salad.
I’ve adapted this wonderful Burmese Indian style chicken curry recipe from a precious little cookbook I picked up from one of my favourite secondhand Yangon bookstores some years ago. It feels like the old primary school textbooks we used in the Seventies and is so fragile with its soft cardboard cover and lightweight paper stock, I try to avoid taking it anywhere near the kitchen.
Dating to 1978, this charming Burmese cookbook is by Mi Mi Khaing and it’s called Cook and Entertain the Burmese Way, and I’ve mentioned it in previous posts as being a real pleasure to read, as much for its insights into Burmese home-cooking and entertaining in the 1970s as for Mi Mi Khaing’s delightful turn of phrase.
The book has become very precious to me this year. I never used to worry about it, as it was so easy to hop on a plane from Siem Reap to Bangkok and then jump onto another to Yangon – you could get an e-visa online in a couple of hours at most – but since the coup early this year, who knows when we’ll get to return to Myanmar.
This Burmese Indian style chicken curry recipe is next in our series of recipes from Myanmar intended to draw attention to the tragic situation in the country, because, infuriatingly, events in Myanmar have largely disappeared from the pages of most mainstream news publications.
So far we’ve published recipes for Burmese street food-style fried chicken, Burmese coconut rice, Burmese raw cabbage salad, a Shan vermicelli noodle salad and a Shan tomato salad recipe. Older recipes include a Burmese egg curry and ohn no khao swe, one of our favourite soups from Myanmar.
If you’re not aware, in February a coup d’état ousted Myanmar’s democratically elected government, which inspired a nationwide civil disobedience movement, to which the military responded with extraordinary brutality, violence against peaceful protestors, raids on homes and abduction of activists, massacres in the streets, and airstrikes on villages, resulting in thousands of deaths of innocent civilians, including frontline workers.
We’ll soon be publishing a dedicated guide to how to help the people of Myanmar and after we do, we’ll continue to share recipes for our favourite dishes from Myanmar with links to the guide. Until then, we’ll highlight organisations that need your support, such as Myanmar Now. The military regime is targeting journalists and the independent news site desperately needs donations to continue its essential reporting work.
Now let me tell you about this Burmese Indian style chicken curry recipe.
Burmese Indian Style Chicken Curry Recipe
When I first bought Mi Mi Khaing’s cookbook and compared her Burmese chicken curry recipe to her Burmese Indian style chicken curry recipe one of the things that surprised me the most was the inclusion of curry powder.
Not necessarily that she included curry powder – curry powder is used widely across Southeast Asia, as well as East Asia – but her inclusion of curry powder in her Indian style Burmese curry, knowing how Indian cooks feel about curry powder.
Salt, turmeric, ginger, garlic, chilli, and onions feature in both Burmese curries. The main differences between the two curries is that the Burmese chicken curry also has ground lemongrass, tomatoes and fish sauce, while the Indian style curry has bay leaves and curry powder.
While there’s no shame in using store-bought curry powder in Myanmar – just as there isn’t elsewhere in Southeast Asia – Mi Mi Khaing explains that because curry powders (and spice blends more generally) don’t stay fresh for long, most home cooks blend their own.
Mi Mi Khaing writes: “…a Burmese housewife without a reliable source of readymade powder makes her own, roasting, pounding, and sieving the seeds and mixing them in different proportions to suit different needs.”
Creating my own curry powder has been on my to-do list for a long time, so this is a good excuse to experiment. I’ll share Mi Mi Khaing’s preferred curry powder blend in my next post, and then my own curry powder when I have a blend I’m happy with. Now for a few tips to making this Burmese Indian style chicken curry recipe.
Tips for Making this Burmese Indian-Style Chicken Curry Recipe
This Burmese Indian style chicken curry is so straightforward, we only have a few tips, starting with what to cook your curry in. While a lot of curry recipes simply call for ‘pots’, we usually use either a big flat round bottomed wok or a Dutch oven. You could also use a big deep frying pan or skillet.
Make sure to rub the chicken pieces with salt, turmeric and ginger as it noticeably adds flavour to the chicken meat. Mi Mi Khaing’s original Indian style Burmese curry called for ground ginger and turmeric.
While Burmese curries, like Indian curries, use more dried spices compared to other northern Southeast Asian curries, we always keep fresh ginger in the fridge, so we used that instead. You could do the same without too much damage.
Cooking some of the chopped onions first until brown ultimately creates a layer of soft silky onions which add depth to the dish – just like in the Moroccan chicken tagine recipe we just published.
Mi Mi Khaing uses a homemade curry powder blend, as most Burmese women do, which includes cumin, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, coriander, peppercorns, bay leaf, and poppy seeds. We’ve shared her full curry powder recipe here, with a couple of tweaks, but you could use a store-bought curry powder.
Cooking the chicken pieces with the spices in a covered pot is crucial to keep the chicken moist and tender, but for the final stage you need to remove the lid so that the sauce can really reduce. Keep an eye on it.
If you find that you’ve allowed the sauce to reduce too much and need to add more water than Khaing adds – though you probably won’t – note that this will also reduce the depth and intensity of the spices. You may want to add more curry powder.
Serve this Burmese Indian style chicken curry with the wonderful Burmese coconut rice we recently shared, a relish or two (recipes coming), and light refreshing salads to provide that much-needed contrasting texture and flavour that the Burmese love so much, such as the crunchy Burmese raw cabbage salad and sweet and juicy Shan tomato salad we recently shared. Links to all recipes earlier in this post.
Burmese Indian Style Chicken Curry Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 kg chicken pieces – mix of thighs and drumsticks - skin on
- 1 tbsp salt
- 1 tsp ground turmeric
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 3 garlic cloves
- 1 ½ cups onion - finely chopped
- ½ cup oil – vegetable oil or peanut oil
- 4 bay leaves
- 1 tsp chilli powder
- 1 tbsp curry powder
- 1 piece chilli - fresh, deseed (optional)
Instructions
- Rub the salt, turmeric and ginger into the chicken pieces and set aside.
- In a large deep frying pan, skillet or Dutch oven, heat the cooking oil, then add the bay leaves and one tablespoon of chopped onion, lowering the heat the second they brown.
- Add the rest of the onion and garlic, stirring continuously, then add the chilli powder and half the curry powder, continuing to stir over low heat.
- Add the chicken pieces, increase the heat slightly, then cover and cook until the chicken starts to brown.
- Once the chicken begins to brown, stir, then add two cups of water, lower the heat, cover, and simmer until the chicken is cooked through.
- Add the rest of the curry powder and continue to cook uncovered until the gravy has reduced and thickened.
- Serve with Burmese coconut rice, a relish and salads.
Nutrition
Please do let us know in the comments below if you make this Burmese Indian style chicken curry recipe as we’d love to know how it turns out for you.de
Hey – this looks interesting! I’m in the middle of cooking it – ground my own spices for curry paste (big tick) but didn’t have enough of things to make the same combination (big fail)! Still…I’m persevering!
Methinks this recipe has an awful lot of oil, particularly when comparing to Burmese chicken curry recipes from other sources. So, it’s cooked, but I’m going to separate chicken and sauce and put it in the fridge overnight to skim the fat off. I think I’ll thank myself!
Love what you do and the vibe you give us. You have mentioned in some of your emails to ‘search’ for a recipe, but I can’t find a search function on your website.
Go well, blessings, Susanne
Hi Susanne
Lovely to hear from you and that you’re making (made!) this dish. Sorry I’m late seeing this.
That is *exactly* the right amount of oil you want. This is a very authentic Burmese recipe, from the legendary Mi Mi Khaing, which we’ve made countless times. I’m guessing other recipes have been adapted for foreigners.
You definitely do *not* want to skim the oil/fat off. You see the oil in the image above, and in this dish: https://grantourismotravels.com/burmese-chicken-curry-recipe/ That’s what you want. That’s why step 7. says “The chicken curry is ready when the clear oil has separated out and sits on top of the thick fragrant gravy beneath it.” :)
Burmese curries are *very* oily. They swim in the stuff. When you travel around the Burmese parts of Myanmar, especially in Yangon, you’ll see curry stands in the street, selling a dozen or more kinds of curries and it looks like they’re sitting in pools of oil. See this pic of a typical curry stall in Yangon: https://grantourismotravels.com/burmese-cuisine/
And that’s one reason that foreign travellers in Myanmar don’t take to the food like they do in Thailand and Vietnam. Although even in Thailand and Cambodia curries are split, so there’s separation between the cream and oil. But that’s not how foreigners like them, so chefs, cooks, food bloggers in the USA, Australia etc tend to serve/photograph them when they look creamy, before they split (occasionally guilty of that!), as that’s how ‘Westerners’ prefer them.
However, with Burmese curries, they’ve never eaten alone with just rice — and the rice is the main dish (like in Thailand, Cambodia etc), with just a little curry eaten; not the converse, as they’re eaten in ‘the west’, with rice more of an accompaniment. In Myanmar, there are always lots of little salads served with curries to soak up the oil and provide a refreshing contrast to the curries.
And the use of so much oil isn’t just about taste, but about preservation. Even now, many people don’t have electricity or refrigeration, but the curries keep for a couple of meals thanks to that oily layer.
Also, when all the chicken has been finished, the leftover fragrant spiced oil will be eaten alone well-combined with warmed leftover rice. You often see mums who run curry stalls giving their little toddlers a bowl of the stuff to keep them occupied while they serve customers. I’m getting hungry just thinking about that!
Thanks for the kind words and taking the time to drop by :)
Hi again Susanne
Sorry, forgot to reply re searching. There are a few ways to search:
1) beneath the orange ‘Grantourismo’, there’s the list of world regions, and to the right of ‘Middle East’ there’s a magnifying glass – click on that and not only does a search box appear, but you’ll also see rows of images and titles for the posts you’ve visited; the more you visit, it separates them into ‘Favourites’, ‘Recently Viewed’, ‘Related’, ‘Latest’, ‘Popular’, and ‘Videos’ at the bottom. If you searched for ‘cabbage recipes’, for instance’, it will organise them into your favourites, latest, popular etc.
2) even better: you should see a heart and magnifying glass centre-right side of every page/post – use the magnifying glass and you’ll see what I described above, BUT if you click on the heart, you can save your favourite recipes/posts in your private account, which you’ll be asked to set up the first time you use that. When you do that the first time, you create the account. It’s private and it can be deleted at any time. You can sign in and out, but I usually stay signed in. So yes, I use it too :) I love the tool.
3) lastly, at the far right end of the orange bar, top of the page, you should see a magnifying glass – click on that and a search box appears :)
Thanks for asking! I wonder if it’s helpful to provide that info somewhere on the site… I might do that.
Let me know if you have more questions :)
Hi Lara
Thanks for your extensive and enlightening replies!
With regard to the search function, I’m reasonably tech savvy (despite my age!) but couldn’t find a way to search. I think it would be really good if you could provide some guidance to others.
Now I’m going to get cheeky and ask about your culinary tours and creative retreats. At 70+, my mobility ain’t that good but my curiosity is still unsated. I am planning my last RTW trip this year, visiting kids in Canada and US; family in UK; friends across Europe; and cousins in Berlin. All places I’ve been before, but not for nearly 40 years! (I’m happily based in a little village in the Adelaide Hills.)
So…RTW…is Siem Reap a good idea? Have you got anything planned for September/October? Could I meet you? (I told you this was cheeky!) I think you have my email in your system for any further discussion – if not, let me know
With blessings
Susanne
Hi Susanne
No worries re the replies :) We started blogging from the very beginnings of blogging when it was a personal endeavour, and despite the ads and other means of monetisation (which enable us to continue running the site), we are not fans of the corporatisation of blogging, and still believe in taking the time to personally respond to readers who have taken the time to comment :)
We can see that readers do use the various search methods, but what they use also depends on what browsers they’re using, whether they have the latest updates, what devices they’re using, etc. There are a lot more functions on the desktop versions than mobile, yet, of course, most people visit from mobile. I’ll chat to Terence about the best option, a post or post.
I can see your email, so I will email you in a few days. Busy prepping for Russian-Ukrainian Easter here in Bendigo where I’m currently taking care of my mum. I do have a client and her husband who I need to run a tour for that I had to postpone to return to Australia, but need to wait to get Aged Care Support in place for Mum before I can make a plan. I’ll email you more details.
Adore the Adelaide Hills! Which village? We know the area well. Adelaide is such a cool little city and love all the wine regions… and the beaches… and the… lucky you!
Ah … a secret little village – centre of the universe if you know about it. Mylor!!! Having lived in 7 different countries, I’ve found myself here for half a lifetime!
Look forward to your email
Best
Susanne
btw – the ‘notify me of new posts by email’ isn’t doing anything for me!
Hi Susanne, ah, Mylor is so charming! (Well, it was when we were last there!). Ah, but that’s weird re the ‘notify me of new posts by email’. I sign up to all these things myself using a gmail address (as does Terence), so we’re aware if something stops working. We’ll look into it. I’m cooking up a storm here for Mum for Russian-Ukrainian Christmas tomorrow (amidst a heatwave!), but I have you on my list to email on Thursday. I’ve got a couple of options for you re Cambodia and meeting up :) More from me soon!
Mylor hasn’t changed a jot in the 35 years I’ve been here – still as precious.
Look forward to hearing from you
Best
Susanne
Hi Susanne, that’s good to know! So many places here have changed, some for the better, others for worse.
We’ve been dealing with a 3-day heatwave here in Bendigo and Central Victoria, with power cuts affecting our internet, and just generally struggling as Mum’s new Aircon isn’t coping. I can’t believe that after 8 years living in the UAE and 15 years in Southeast Asia, I find the heat more challenging to deal with here. This part of Australia is just not equipped for it.
We’ve had a cool change today and it feels like winter now LOL. Once I get on top of work I couldn’t get done the last three days I’ll email you. Most likely Sunday.
Stay cool!
Lara