Crock Pot Chicken Makhani (Indian Butter Chicken)

I love Indian food.  I order it a couple times a month, but for a long time was unable to replicate it at home.  I found several recipes that were plenty tasty, but just didn't taste like the Indian food that I was used to ordering.

Chicken Tikka Masala is one of my favorites.  Turns out, it's not an authentic Indan dish, but one that Curry Houses in the UK have made to replicate the Indian Butter Chicken that one might find in India.  (Pretty sure my college English professor would kill me for that sentence.  He always hated when we said things like "One might find".  He was vehemently against using the word "one" in such a context.  I'm getting off topic.

I've been blogging a lot about my crock pot and how I want to use it for more than just soups and stews.  I figured, why not look for an Indian recipe that I can make in the crock pot.  I found this one and made it today.

The recipe calls for cardamom pods.  I didn't want to go through the trouble of sewing cardamom pods together, so I googled to find out what the equivalent would be for ground cardamom (1 pod = 1/6 tsp ground cardamom)  That's much easier!

It also calls for tomato paste.  I used the one that has basil in it.  Yum!  For the yogurt, I used Greek Yogurt.  I actually prefer Icelandic yogurt, but I haven't been able to find an unflavored one.  There are plenty of brands of Greek Yogurt that make a plain version so I used that.

all the ingredients ready to go!

To juice the lemon, I used this handy gadget.  It makes squeezing and measuring much easier, and a lot less messy:

I wish blogger would let me rotate images.

After letting everything cook in the crock pot all day, I returned to this:

yum!

For side dishes, I made Roasted Asparagus, of course!  And I cooked up a box of Rice Pilaf with Lentils.  I added some cumin and cilantro (in a squeezable tube!)

I thought everything came out really well.  Here's a look at the finished, plated project.  (I'm really trying to work on my food photography skills):

a delicious and flavorful dinner!