Ammi's Recipe for Mirach Goshth

A precious recipe passed on from a dear friend, mirach goshth is everything you want from a chicken curry — moist and succulent meat and comforting flavours.

My life has been a kaleidoscope of flavours, textures and, of course, taste. Born into a vegetarian family with roots in Tirunelveli and Thiruvananthapuram, I married into a predominantly non-vegetarian family from Bihar. Little was I prepared for the 180-degree turn my culinary palate was about to undergo! From no-garlic, very little onion, coconut-centric food, I was forced to acclimatise to a cuisine with meat, and mustard oil.

Eventually, I learnt not only to eat meat with relish, but also, to cook it with gusto — but it was a long journey. A dear friend helped me make that transition with her remarkable recipes.

She was from Kanpur, and her Abbu ran a hotel there. People would travel from far and wide to eat the mirach goshth served in his hotel. Mirach Goshth was Ammi’s invention. It was a subtle variation on aachari goshth, made simply with the addition of mango pickle to a mutton curry. Ammi found the pickle flavour too overwhelming, so she deconstructed the recipe — she made a mild garam-masala-flavoured curry with a yoghurt-base, and then added green chillies, fennel and nigella seeds for that bold punch, but with more balance.

After Abbu passed away, my friend brought Ammi to live with her in Delhi. Ammi was the most soft-spoken, petite, instantly loveable person, who made incredible melt-in-the-mouth kababs. My friend never cooked, but somehow, it seemed all Ammi’s recipes were passed on to her through osmosis. I was her able student.  Over the years, she taught me so much — many of my signature dishes are truly Ammi’s — and my personal favourite is mirach goshth (that is how Ammi would pronounce it, with an ‘a’).

It is easy to look at this recipe and relegate it as commonplace, and, in fact, much of it is standard for those who are used to cooking with onion bases and garam masala. However, it is only on recreating it, will one truly appreciate the subtle additions that make this deceptively mundane curry a unique, subtle, work of genius!

Mirach goshth can be made with mutton or chicken. In fact, a vegetarian version with paneer tastes equally good. Cooked in garam masala-infused yoghurt gravy with lots of green chilli, and finished with kalonji (nigella seeds) and saunf (fennel seeds), this is food fit for the gods.

Recipe: Ammi’s Mirach Goshth

Ingredients
1 kg chicken without skin, medium cut (16 pieces)

For the marinade
1 cup dahi or yoghurt (fresh and thick, not sour)
10 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tsp red chilli powder
1 tsp salt

For the masala
2 tbs ghee plus 1 tbs refined oil
400 g onions chopped fine
½ inch cinnamon
4 cloves
1 green cardamom
1 tbs coriander seeds
½ tsp jeera (cumin)
2 bay leaves

For the garnish
20 green chillies (choose a non-spicy variety) slit lengthwise and deseeded
1 tbsp saunf (the cooking variety, not the slim table saunf/fennel)
1 tsp kalonji/nigella seeds/mangrela

Method

Wash the chicken in cold running water and let the water drain. Beat the yoghurt to a smooth paste and add the garlic, chilli powder and salt. Marinate the chicken with the yoghurt mixture for at least an hour. If you want to marinate it for more than an hour, then it should be kept in the fridge.

Heat a karahi (do not use an iron karahi because when you add the yoghurt it will make your curry black), to this add the ghee and oil and fry the onions till golden.

Now add the cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, coriander seeds and jeera, and fry for another couple of minutes. Drain and remove the onion masala from the oil. Keep aside to cool.

Now remove the chicken pieces from the marinade, scrape the yoghurt back into the bowl and keep the chicken on a separate plate.

To the fried onions and garam masala, add the remaining yoghurt marinade and grind to a fine paste. Add 2-3 ice cubes while grinding. This will ensure that the flavours are preserved and the vessel does not heat up. Add as much water as you need for your mixer to grind the masala to a fine paste. Use only cold water.

Next, reheat the karahi with the remaining ghee (If the onion is fried well, the ghee would have separated out). In case there is no leftover ghee add a tablespoon of ghee into the karahi.

Then add 2-3 pieces of chicken at a time, stirring constantly, keeping the flame high. Once the chicken develops colour, add the next batch, stirring constantly until all the chicken pieces are browned nicely. If you put all the chicken in one go, instead of browning, the water will come out, and you will have soggy, stringy boiled chicken – not a good idea.

In case you are not confident with stir frying, fry a couple of pieces of chicken on high flame, remove them onto a plate, then stir fry the next batch and remove. Repeat until all the chicken pieces have been fried. Basically, you have sealed in the juices.

Next, add the bay leaves and the ground masala and fry for 5-6 minutes until the yoghurt is cooked. Now add the chicken and about two cups of water. You may have to adjust the thickness of the gravy to your family’s preference. Check the salt and adjust to taste.

Cover and cook until the chicken is done, about 7 to 10 mins approximately. Finally, add the slit green chilies, saunf (fennel) and kalonji (nigella seeds), mix well and cover with a well fitting lid. Now put the flame off and leave for 10 minutes for the flavours to develop and infuse into the gravy.

Serve with hot basmati rice or any other rice of your choice cooked with a tablespoon of ghee.

 Note:

This curry freezes very well. If you have made an extra quantity then take away the extra before adding the green chillies and fennel and nigella seeds and freeze it. When you want to serve it ,thaw and boil, till it has heated through, then add the  slit green chillies and fennel and nigella seeds and cover and leave to infuse before serving.

For the vegetarian version take half a kg of paneer, soak it for 10 minutes in warm water with a tsp of salt. This is to make the paneer soft and taste fresh. Drain the water, pat dry and cut into one inch cubes. In a tablespoon each of oil and ghee, pan fry the paneer pieces gently. Make the gravy as you would for the chicken, and add the paneer once the gravy is ready. Finish off with a couple of dollops of cream

Meena Raj is a writer and sculptor with roots in Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

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