Garlic Chilli Chicken Curry - Khin's Kitchen (2024)

A simple and delicious garlic chilli chicken recipe packed with flavour. Made with tender chicken thighs, onions, tomatoes, and aromatic garlicky curry sauce. A perfect quick weeknight meal the whole family can enjoy and ready in 30 minutes!

We love curries and we've shared both homestyle and restaurants style curries on our website. Naga Chicken Curry, Lamb Tikka Masala, Chicken Handi, and Ceylon Chicken are popular recipes that you don't want to miss!

This dish is not a traditional Indian curry recipe. It's one of the most popular curry dishes in UK Indian takeaways and restaurants. Takeaways and restaurants use pre-cooked chicken and pre-cooked curry base but in this recipe, we are cooking from scratch.

If you love chilli and garlic flavour, this is the right recipe for you! It contains loads of garlic, 3 types of chillies, and a few classic Indian spices and aromatics. It's an absolute favourite in our family and we love to serve it with fluffy basmati rice.

Why you would love this recipe

It's freezer and fridge-friendly, so you can prepare a big batch for later use.
A super quick and easy curry that you can whip up everything from scratch in 30 minutes. No pre-cooked, or readymade curry pastes and curry sauces are needed for this recipe.

It's a versatile curry, even though this dish is medium hot chicken curry, you can customize it by reducing the spices or adding additional spices to your taste. Plus, you can also add your choice of meat or vegetables and make it your own-style chicken chilli garlic curry.

What do we need

• Chicken - I used boneless skinless chicken thighs in this recipe. You can also use chicken breast, bone-in chicken pieces, or even add pre-cooked boiled chicken, or chicken tikka.
• Ground spices - turmeric, Kashmiri chilli powder, curry powder, and garam masala are basic spices you will need.
• Whole spices & aromatics - highly recommend adding green cardamom pods and Kasuri methi ( dried fenugreek leaves ).
• 3 types of chillies - dry crushed chillies, fresh green chillies, and Kashmiri chilli powder are ideal for this hot curry recipe.
• Garlic & ginger- you will need both chopped garlic, freshly grated garlic paste, and ginger paste.
• Shallots & tomatoes - I love to use shallot onions and ripened vine tomatoes. Add additional tomato puree ( concentrate ) to bring more colour and flavour.
• Ginger and coriander - freshly chopped coriander and thinly sliced ginger strips for garnish.
• Can I add vegetables? Yes, you can simply add extra veggies like potatoes, carrots, courgettes, butternut squash, etc.

How to cook it

Following is a quick guide. Detailed measurements and a full written recipe are available on the recipe card at the bottom of the page.

1. Heat the oil to medium heat, add cardamom and follow with the chopped garlic.
2. Once the garlic is fragrant add onions and cook until the onions are soft and translucent. Then add garlic and ginger paste and continue saute until the onions are light brown.
3. Next, add chopped tomatoes and cook until the oil starts to separate.
4. Then add the tomato puree and follow with the ground spices and dry crushed chillies.

5. Add the chicken pieces, stir it well and cook for 1-2 minutes.
6. Then add the water and season with salt to taste. Continue cook for another 15-20 minutes or until the chicken is tender.
7. Stir in chopped green chillies and dried fenugreek leaves.
8. Turn off the heat and finish with coriander.

Commonly asked questions

Ingredients variations

• This dish is medium spicy and it contains chilli powder, crushed chilli flakes, and fresh green chillies. If you prefer mild curry, adjust the chilli heat by reducing the amount of chilli or omit crushed chillies or green chillies to your taste.
• Protein - instead of chicken you can also try this dish with lamb, beef, paneer, etc. Red meat and bone-in meat can take longer to be cooked through. You might want to increase the cooking time.
• For a vegetarian and vegan option, use Quorn meat, tofu, potato, cauliflower, courgette, etc.
• Kashmiri chilli powder - it has a vibrant red colour and is rich in flavour. If you cannot get Kashmiri chilli powder, use regular hot or mild chilli powder.
• To increase the serving size, you can simply double this recipe and use a large heavy bottom pot.
• Garlic pickle - You can also add a tablespoon of Indian garlic pickle to the curry sauce just right before serving. It brings tangy, spicy, garlicky flavour to the curry.

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