Butter Chicken with Garlic Naan

Ingredients

• 700g chicken thighs, trimmed and cut into bite-sized pieces
• 50g butter
• 1 large onion, finely chopped
• 4 garlic cloves (2 crushed for sauce, 2 for naan)
• 25g fresh ginger, grated
• 2 tbsp curry powder
• 400g tomato passata
• 150ml double cream
• 1 tsp caster sugar
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil (neutral)
• 300g plain flour
• 150g natural yoghurt
• 1 tsp baking powder
• Kachumber salad, to serve

Method

1. Pat the chicken pieces dry and season generously with salt and pepper — water means steam, and steam means no browning. Set aside while you start the base.
2. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a large heavy pan over medium heat and cook the onion for 8–10 minutes, stirring now and then, until soft, translucent and just starting to catch gold at the edges. Add the crushed garlic and grated ginger and cook for 30 seconds, no more — just until fragrant. Burnt garlic turns the whole dish bitter, so watch it.
3. Push the onions to one side, add the remaining 1 tbsp oil and tip in the curry powder. Bloom the spices in the hot oil for 30–60 seconds until fragrant and deepened in colour. Raw curry powder tastes dusty; bloomed, it tastes of itself.
4. Turn the heat up and add the chicken in two batches, spreading each batch in a single layer. Don't crowd the pan — all at once and water comes out, and you've stewed the meat instead of searing it. Cook each batch for 2–3 minutes until the edges colour, then return everything to the pan.
5. Pour in the passata along with a splash of water to loosen — the liquid breaks the tomatoes down so they taste of fruit, not tin. Stir in the sugar, season again with salt and pepper, then drop the heat and simmer gently for 12–15 minutes until the chicken is cooked through and the sauce clings to the back of a spoon.
6. Stir in the butter and double cream and simmer for 2–3 minutes until the sauce is glossy, burnished orange, and coats every piece. Taste, season, taste again — adjust now, not at the table. Keep warm over the lowest flame.
7. Meanwhile, mix the flour with the baking powder and a pinch of salt. Stir in the yoghurt and 1 tbsp oil to form a soft, slightly tacky dough, then rest for 10 minutes — the rest lets the flour hydrate and the naans roll out without snapping back. Divide into 6 pieces and roll each thin, about 3mm.
8. Heat a dry, heavy frying pan over high heat until smoking. Cook the naans one at a time for 1–2 minutes each side until puffed with charred blistered spots. Mix the melted butter with the crushed garlic and brush generously over each hot naan as it comes off the pan.
9. Spoon the butter chicken into warm bowls, scatter the chopped coriander over the top, squeeze a lemon wedge over each portion, and tuck the garlic naans alongside for scooping.