Chile-Coriander Chicken
Shopping List
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1.5 - 2 lbs boneless chicken thighs
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1 Tbl Ginger People "grated" ginger paste
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1 Tbl cilantro paste
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2 Tbl Lemon Juice
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1.5 Tbl whole coriander seeds
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2 tsp whole black peppercorns
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1 tsp cumin seeds
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3 Tbl vegetable oil
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1 Tbl ground cayenne pepper
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1.5 tsp salt
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Whole romaine lettuce leaves
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1 pint Grape or cherry tomatoes
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Sour cream
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Tortillas
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6-12 cloves garlic
Staples Used
Recipe
At least two hours beforehand
- Heat a dry skillet over medium heat. Add the coriander, peppercorns, and cumin, and toast for a few minutes, shaking periodically. When that is fragrant (and before it begins to burn), remove from the heat, let cool a bit, and grind in the spice mill.
- While that it going on, in the mini-prep, put in the oil, ginger, garlic (can be left as whole cloves, since it's going to get chopped), lemon juice, cayenne, and salt.
- Add the ground spices, and run the mini-prep until the garlic is reasonably well-reduced. Add the cilantro paste, and run it for another second or two.
- Put the chicken into a ziploc bag. Pour the sauce (which should be fairly thick) over it, and squish everything together until the sauce is decently well covering the chicken. Seal the bag, and put in the fridge for 1.5-6 hours.
Cooking
- Heat the grill, clean and oil it.
- Grill the chicken over medium-high heat until done. (It's thighs -- as usual, they're pretty forgiving, so don't be afraid to cook them properly through.)
- While that's going on, cut the tomatoes in half, and prepare the tortillas.
Serving
In each tortilla, put one whole lettuce leaf, some sour cream, some chicken, and some tomatoes. (Kate and I build our tortillas a little differently, but basically the same proportions.)
Do not add hot sauce: this dish absolutely doesn't need it, and it'll just get in the way of the flavor.
Notes
This is adapted from Steven Raichlen's The Barbecue! Bible, a fine tome on the subject; he further attributes the recipe to a food stall named Bademiya, near the Taj Mahal Hotel in Bombay. Raichlen's version is probably a bit better than this, but I've wound up adapting it to our tastes and simplifying it for a weeknight meal, so it's drifted to the point where it's worth writing up myself.
We make this with boneless thighs rather than whole legs.
Yes, it's a full Tbl of cayenne. This chicken is pretty ferociously firey, which is why even Kate finds the sour cream essential.
Although it's only half the chicken by weight, make a full recipe of marinade.
Marinade: omit the water entirely, and let it be a bit thick. Use whole garlic cloves (they don't need to be crushed), jarred minced ginger, and a tablespoon of the prepared cilantro: there's no need to fuss with these ingredients.
Instead of pouring the marinade over the chicken, do the standard squish-in-a-ziploc approach: it's effective and easy.
This dish requires some work (30-45 minutes) in the early afternoon, prepping the marinade, and then marinating until dinner time. It's not a crisis if you don't get the full six hours -- marinating for two works fine.
Goes With: Works well as fajitas, but with (a little) sour cream instead of guac, and simpler veggies: lettuce (whole leaf inside the tortilla), halved cherry tomato, etc.
This comes out quite spicy (tablespoon of cayenne!), so it wants at most a small amount of hot sauce; it's basically fine without any.
-- Not much work, and quite tasty -- this has become one of our standard summertime dinner rotation dishes.
Variations
