Finger Lickin’ Butter Chicken (Murgh Makhani)
Delicious restaurant-style butter chicken made right at home with simple ingredients. This recipe is exactly how they make butter chicken in restaurants – and I’ve had people tell me it’s actually better! Trust me when I say it’s finger-lickin’ good!
Finger-Lickin’ butter chicken! That’s a little too much fun to say.
Sharing one of my all time favorite Indian food recipes today.
Last week I had this intense craving for creamy and spicy homemade butter chicken. I mean, it was so crazy that I could practically taste the butter chicken in my mouth as I thought about it. My heart started racing, my hands started shaking — okay, it wasn’t quite that dramatic; but you get the idea. I dug down deep into the LSJ files (this is actually one of the first recipes I ever posted on the blog!) It was time to retake some of the pictures and reintroduce you to my finger-lickin’ butter chicken recipe.
Not only am I replacing some of my old (read: not so great) photography. But I also reworked the recipe to make the ingredient list a little shorter without compromising any of the flavors. I also took the liberty of making the instructions easier to follow I am sharing my tried and true tips on how you can get this on the table even quicker on weeknights!
I can’t say I take all the credit for this recipe. This recipe comes from my mom, who got it from her sister, who once upon a time worked at a very popular Indian restaurant. So there. It’s authentic, restaurant-style butter chicken, for reals. <– I just took the liberty of tweaking a few things to make this recipe attainable for us everyday people. I promise you all tweaks are simple and don’t compromise the flavor!
Trust me when I say this, I took my job very seriously and strive to provide you with the best restaurant-style butter chicken you’ve ever had!
Recipe Video – How to Make This in 63 Seconds:
So about that BUTTER chicken. Ironically enough my recipe doesn’t contain that much butter. Butter chicken is also called ‘Murgh Makani’ and when translated to English, it means Butter Chicken. And in fact, the butter in this recipe is actually clarified butter or ghee.
Nowadays, ghee is readily available in most mainstream grocery stores. You can definitely find it at Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods. And if you live in an area where your supermarket doesn’t stock it, you can always purchase it online here.
Ingredients for Homemade Butter Chicken:
- Chicken: Feel free to use boneless skinless chicken breasts or boneless skinless chicken thighs for this recipe. I typically cut the chicken into 1½ inch pieces and then toss it in a marinade made with yogurt and spices.
- Seasonings: Butter chicken calls for an array of spices. To help curb the ingredient list, I use a sachet of tandoori masala. It’s usually available in powder/paste form in the international aisle. The one I use and LOVE can be found here. This helps cut down on the number of spices you’ll need. Don’t get me wrong, you’ll still need a little garam masala, cumin powder, coriander powder, and some red chili powder. You can also swap the red chili powder for cayenne but the flavor will be slightly different. I also find cayenne pepper to be hotter so I would suggest using slightly less than what’s called for. But you won’t need ground turmeric and a few others as the tandoori masala already contains these. Garam masala is South Asian spice mix that contains ingredients like cloves, black pepper, black cardamom, cinnamon, green cardamom, and several other spices.
- Fenugreek Leaves: In Urdu and Hindi fenugreek leaves are called kasuri methi. This is an ingredient you can easily find in almost any South Asian grocery store as it is used in many dishes. If your mainstream grocery store has an international aisle, they may carry it there as well.
- Fresh Ginger and Garlic: A lot of traditional Pakistani and Indian recipe call for freshly prepared ginger and garlic paste. Essentially, it’s just a combination of peeled knobs of ginger and a handful of cloves garlic broken down in a food processor with a little vinegar to help keep these ingredients fresh and some water. Some people also add a little oil for preservation, but this is optional. Nowadays, most South Asian grocery stores (as well as mainstream stores) sell prepared garlic and ginger paste. Feel free to make your own or purchase it for this recipe.
- Oil: You’ll need some oil to saute the onions and cook the butter chicken recipe. Feel free to use avocado oil, canola or even coconut oil for this.
- Yogurt: I like to use plain yogurt for this recipe. My mom has always taught me to beat the yogurt with the seasonings before adding the chicken pieces to ensure that the flavor disperses evenly throughout the chicken pieces.
- Ghee: We’ll use ghee (also called clarified butter) to prepare the butter chicken sauce for this recipe.
- Crushed Tomatoes: I use a can of crushed tomatoes for my butter chicken recipe. We’ll saute the onions season them with lots of spices and cook them with the tomatoes. The tomato puree will then be the base of the butter chicken sauce.
- Onions: You’ll need a large yellow onion that is sliced down the middle, peeled and then cut into thin slices. Like most south Asian recipes, this one too starts with sauteing the onions in a little ghee until they’re soft. A lot of recipes call for golden brown onions which add add sweetness to the dish when the onions are caramelized. My butter chicken recipe doesn’t take the onions that far. You want the onions to soften and turn translucent, but not brown.
- Heavy Cream: My family has always used heavy cream or heavy whipping cream for our homemade butter chicken recipe. If you are dairy-free full-fat coconut milk would make a good substitution as this is what many of my readers have mentioned using.
- Prepared Rice or Naan Bread: You’ll want to serve this up with my restaurant-style fluffy basmati rice or homemade naan. I’ve got a couple of different naan recipes that I’ve shared. You can make my high protein2-ingredient flatbread or my traditional naan recipe for this. I’ll even rub it down with a little garlic butter and garnish with chopped cilantro. Trust me, these naans are fantastic!
How to make the best butter chicken recipe
- Marinate the chicken for maximum flavor. Whisk the ginger garlic paste, yogurt, and seasoning together until the yogurt is smooth. Add the chicken piece and let this hang out. The longer you marinate the more flavorful the chicken. Ideally, you want to let it go for 12-24 hours, covered in the refrigerator, but even 20-60 minutes will do. The yogurt, ginger, and garlic really help make the chicken more tender. As always, I’m a fan of white-meat chicken, so I used boneless skinless chicken breasts, but you could go the dark meat route and use chicken thighs as well. Some may even tell you it’s more flavorful that way. I’m not one of those people!
- Make the butter chicken curry. To a Dutch oven or any heavy bottom pan, add the ghee and saute the onions over medium high heat until they are soft and translucent. Add the ginger and garlic paste and give it a few seconds to bloom in the oil. Add the seasonings – chili powder, cumin, and coriander and let the spices cook in the oil. Stir often to keep them from sticking and burning. If you find the spices are cooking too quickly, you can add a splash of water or even chicken broth if you’d like. Blend the sauce in a traditional blender or use an immersion blender to make this quick and easy.
- Make ahead option. At this point, you can refrigerate the butter chicken sauce once it’s cooled down in an airtight container. You can also add it to a freezer-safe container or zippable bag and freeze it. This makes weekday dinner so much quicker to get out on the table. Marinate the chicken on Sunday and pull it together in about 20 minutes on a Monday. That’s faster than ordering take-out and trust me, it tastes better too!
- Finish it up. Remove the marinated chicken from the refrigerator 30 minutes before cooking. This is so that the yogurt has a chance to come to room temperature. I find that if you add it cold from the fridge the temperature difference sometimes causes the yogurt to curdle. To another clean pot or if you used a traditional blender, to the same pot add the remaining oil and heat it over medium heat. Add the marinated chicken. You want to discard any additional marinade. Saute the chicken until it’s golden on add aides. Add the prepared butter chicken sauce to the pot and stir to combine. You want to let the chicken finish cooking before you and the heavy cream and 1/2 teaspoon garam masala. Once the sauce reaches a simmer, taste and adjust the salt as needed. Then crush the fenugreek leaves between the palms of your hands to release their flavor and add them to the butter chicken. Butter chicken over fluffy basmati rice, it’s what my dreams are made of. If you’re looking for an authentic murgh makhani recipe, I’ve got you!
FAQs about Murgh Makani:
Butter chicken sauce is made of sauteed onions, tomato puree, and lots of spices. It’s finished at the end with a smattering of heavy cream and some fenugreek leaves.
Butter chicken and Murgh Makani are the same thing. Literally translated ‘murgh’ means chicken, and ‘makhani’ means buttery (or butter.) It always makes me laugh when people argue that a recipe tasted more like murgh makhani than butter chicken.
Chicken tikka masala packs more of a punch when it comes to spices, and may or may not contain any butter. I reserve the ghee for my butter chicken and opt for oil when I’m making chicken tikka masala. Butter chicken also is a tad bit sweeter (because of the sauteed onions or the addition of sugar in many recipes) and milder when it comes to spices than chicken tikka masala.
You can make the of this recipe, blend it, and allow it to cool completely before popping it in the refrigerator for 24-48 hours. Like most Indian food, leftovers (or sauces prepared ahead) actually make the dish more flavorful. Many readers have also mentioned that they like to prepare the sauce and freeze it (without the heavy cream) to make butter chicken quicker on weeknights. This is something my family does as well!
If you like this butter chicken recipe, you might also like:
- chicken tikka masala
- 30-minute shrimp masala
- weeknight chana masala
- homemade palak paneer
- 30-minute brown lentil daal
Original recipe shared Feb 2016, updated with new post and images May 2023.
Finger Lickin' Butter Chicken (Murgh Makhani)
Delicious restaurant-style butter chicken made right at home with simple ingredients. This recipe is exactly how they make butter chicken in restaurants -- and i've had people tell me it's actually better! Trust me when I say it's finger lickin' good!
Ingredients
Chicken Marinade:
- 1 lb. boneless chicken breast, cut into 1 ½ inch cubes (see notes)
- 2 tablespoons tandoori masala (see notes)
- 1 teaspoon EACH: ginger paste and garlic paste (I used Gourmet Garden)
- ½ cup yogurt
- 1 tablespoon oil
Butter Chicken Sauce:
- 2 tablespoons ghee (clarified butter) (see note)
- 1 large onion, thinly sliced
- 1 ½ teaspoon EACH: ginger paste and garlic paste (I used Gourmet Garden)
- 1 (14.5 ounce) can crushed tomatoes
- 1 teaspoon chili powder (see notes)
- 1 1/2 teaspoon coriander powder
- 1 1/2 teaspoon cumin powder
- 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1/2 teaspoon garam masala
- ¼ teaspoon dried fenugreek leaves (crushed between fingers)
Instructions
Chicken:
- In a medium bowl, combine the tandoori masala, ginger, garlic, and yogurt. Whisk until smooth, adjust seasonings to preference. Add the chicken and allow to marinate for at least 20 minutes and ideally for 12-24 hours, covered in the refrigerator.
Butter Chicken Sauce:
- Heat the ghee in a dutch oven or heavy bottom pot over medium heat. Add the onions and sauté until they turn translucent and start to sweat, about 5-7 minutes, don't allow the onions to brown. Add ginger and garlic paste and let cook for 30 seconds, stirring so it doesn't burn. Add the can of crushed tomatoes along with the chili powder, coriander powder, and cumin powder and continue to cook for 5 minutes, if the mixture starts bubbling rapidly, add about ¼ cup of water and continue to cook.
- Remove from heat, add the mixture to a blender and blend until smooth, you may need to add a couple water to help it blend (up to ¼ cup). Depending on how powerful your blender is, you may want to blend the mixture in two batches. Remember to hold the lid of the blender down with a kitchen towel when blending, to avoid accidents.
- MAKE AHEAD OPTION: At this point you can cool and refrigerate the sauce for 24-48 hours (or freeze it for up to 3 months), it will help blend the flavors even more, just remember to bring the sauce back to room temperature (use the microwave) before proceeding with the recipe OR you can continue on with the recipe immediately.
Assembly:
- Heat the remaining tablespoon of oil in the dutch oven over medium heat. Add the marinated chicken (discard any excess marinade) and cook for about 5-6 minutes, stirring as required to brown all sides. Add the butter chicken sauce to the pot and heat everything through. Once it starts to bubble, add the cream and garam masala. When the sauce regains a simmer, add the crushed fenugreek leaves. Serve over basmati rice or with naan.
Notes
- Fan of dark meat chicken? You can replace the cubed chicken breasts with cubed boneless, skinless chicken thighs for more added flavor.
- GHEE: If you can't find it you replace it with 1 tablespoon butter and 1 tablespoon oil.
- TANDOORI MASALA: is available in powder/ paste form. I prefer the powder but some of my readers recommended Patak's brand tandoori paste. You'll need about 2-4 tablespoons of the paste (to preference).
- CHILI POWDER: optional! If you prefer milder food, you may want to leave it out as the tandoori masala already has heat. Traditionally, a spicy pepper similar to cayenne is used. If you can't find Indian or Pakistani chili powder (usually sold at Indian stores), replace it with cayenne. 1 teaspoon can be a lot so if you prefer a milder flavor, replace with 1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon.
Loved this recipe! Definitely reminds me of the butter chicken I have ordered in restaurants. A make again for sure! I couldn’t find any tandoori Marsala in the regular grocery store, will have to do some deeper searching for next time! Also, when I added the chicken I found the yogurt marinade curdled a bit. Maybe I should have cooled the sauce to room temp before adding it in? Overall an excellent and easy weeknight dinner. Thanks so much for sharing! 🙂
This will be the fourth time I’m making this dish. It is absolutely delicious! I’ve tried a lot of different recipes for Butter Chicken but they have never really produced the flavors I like. This one does! Very little ingredients and prep work. This has become my go to recipe when I’m short on time! Thank you so much!
This is such a delicious recipe, I make it all the time. It isn’t exactly restaurant-style but it is WAY better than Sharwood’s or Patak’s jar sauce from the supermarket. Honestly, I like the jar sauces but there is NEVER enough sauce for everyone unless I buy so much that it becomes uneconomical and it never completely satisfies my cravings.
i have tweaked this here and there out of sheer laziness; regular whipping cream instead of heavy, garlic powder/minced garlic instead of paste, minced ginger in a jar rather than paste or fresh, one full single-serve fage yogurt cup to minimize waste, minced onions instead of sliced, etc without significantly changing the taste. Usually I’m rather heavy-handed with the spices, sometimes with the crushed tomatoes too, and I even sprung for some fairly cheap kashmiri chili powder from a local indian store that really gives the dish a vibrant red color supposedly with less heat. Spice Hunter’s Global Fusion Tandoori Rub works marvelously as well. I’ve forgotten the butter before (leave it to me to forget the butter in butter chicken) and while I wouldn’t recommend doing that, it was still delicious.
I made this last night and it turned out so delicious! It was a little spicier than I generally prefer (I like mild spice), so next time I’ll cut down on the chili powder (I used cayenne) since the tandoori masala has a good amount of kick to it already. Based on other comments, I was confused about the amount of coriander to use, and it does not appear that the question has ever been resolved by the author. So, I started with 1.5 teaspoons and gradually increased by taste. I’m not sure exactly how much I ended up adding, but I estimate that it was something close to 1.5 tablespoons.
Thank you so much for your recepie. I just cooked your butter chicken I use fresh tomatoes as my husband doesn’t like tomato teste at all. It’s delicious just like at restaurant:-)
I was also looking for some recipe to make butter chicken more delicious. I have had butter chicken in many restaurants in Brampton but was missing home made taste. But now I will try this at home and let you know. Anyways thanks for sharing such useful information.
Yes, i love adding yogurt to the chicken recipe. It is so delicious. By the way, can I use coconut milk or milk instead of whipping cream? Thank you for amazing recipe!
Wow. That’s all I have to say! I’ve been looking for a recipe just like this for so long. I’ve made butter chicken after butter chicken only to be disappointed because it’s bithing like what I get at my favorite restaurants….until now! This is life changing!! Thank you so much for this recipe. ?
Awesome recipe..really fingerlicking good…My husband love this…Love the smell..better than restaurant food. So easy to make and tasty. Loved it. Thankyou.
Tried, tested and love it!! Been looking for an authentic butter chicken recipe for a while, stumbled upon this by accident and won over my hubby who was not a fan of butter chicken. Made it for a family function of 35 people, just adjusted the recipe and empty plates all round. Thank you!!
thank you so much for sharing this recipe. it turned out to be amazing and everytime I make it gets better and better
Marzia, Thanks for sharing an amazing recipe. I have been trying to recreate the butter chicken/chicken tikka masala for two decades now and this one just hits the spot. Wow. This is amazing. I did make one change. Rather than add garam masala to the gravy, I fried some whole garam masala (cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, black pepper) along with juliennes of green chiles and ginger. Then added the chicken and gravy to that (kind of like a tadka/tempering).
Can I marinate the chicken also ahead of time and freeze it in addition to the sauce? I appreciate your advice. Thanks!
Not too sure about freezing the chicken as you run the risk of the yogurt separating and/or curdling and making the sauce grainy when you cook it. If you decide to give it a go, I’d love to know how it went!
I did it your recipe is soo amazing?❤️
I’ve been looking for a good butter chicken recipe for years!! This was absolutely fantastic. My kids are begging for more. Thank you! 🙂
This was really really good!
What can I substitute the fenugreek with?
You can simply omit it from the recipe.
Made it for my family using a mixture of butter and olive oil. It was good, although it lacked a bit of the sweet and savoury flavour that i note in most butter chicken recipes. That aside, it was still had very good flavour. I added about a tsp of each salt and maple syrup. Although I did not plan too far in advance and only marinaded for about an hour, it still turned out nice and tender. I will definitely try this recipe again, marinading overnight and make the sauce ahead of time, although with my own adjustments to the recipe.
Normally don’t leave reviews, but this was so good I had to! Although it’s not quite the restaurant style that I remember, it is the closest any recipe has ever got me. Easy to make – both my husband and I loved it.
Made this for dinner tonight and it was fantastic! Perfect balance of sweet, savory and spicy. This will be my go-to butter chicken recipe!
Intend to make this this weekend. The photos show jalapeño and green flecks…cilantro? Did you incorporate that into the recipe, or use only as garnish? Thank you –
Garnish, just for pictures!
1 lb is hw many grams of chicken.can we use chicken with bone. If using fresh tomatoes hw many can be used.
I loved making this dish and it turned out very well! It was super yummy and rich ??? you did a great job explaining the recipe!
Help – I’m in Australia and the tandoori masala isn’t avaiable near me. Is there anything at all that is an equal subsitute, or is anyone able to portion out the spices to make the mix?
Thanks very much 🙂
You can buy tandoori spice mix in Coles. It’s near the salt & pepper sections.
If I want more than 1 lb chicken. Should I double the whole receipe ?
I plan on making this butter chicken this evening and am looking for a basmati rice recipe on your site but am having difficulty finding one. Do you have one? Did I miss seeing a link? I found a link to your garlic naan on another recipe.
Tasty!!thank u 🙂
I just wanted to say a huge thank you for this recipe it turned out amazing! I’m glad I doubled the recipe because everyone ate until bursting ? it’s very yummy, easy and authentic!
Had to comment because I saw couple of comments saying their butter chicken ended up grainy rather than smooth. I think it is because of their sauce getting split rather than making an error in the recipe/not blending the sauce enough. Butter chicken is actually a very hard sauce because it contains yogurt, cream, butter and tomato sauce. Yogurt and cream are the reason why sauces can split while butter, tomato sauces and other salty products increase the risks of it happening. Splitting is a process where liquid separates from the rest of the yogurt/cream ingredients (those are the little grainy elements). You can look up more about this on the Internet but here are some tips that can lower the risks of your sauce splitting:
– Instead of Turkish or Greek yogurt, use natural yogurt. I think it doesn’t split as much as Turkish or Greek yogurt.
– Wait for the chicken yogurt marinade to get to room temperature before starting to cook it, adding cold yogurt to a hot pan makes it split 100%. Even if you didn’t refrigerate the marinade over night, wait for the temperature of the yogurt to rise. Also take the cream out of your refrigerator a good time before using it (once again you don’t want to add cold cream to a hot sauce).
– As the recipe states, only use medium heat AT MOST. Cooking the yogurt marinated chicken on too hot pan makes the yogurt split. Same goes later on in the recipe, do not heat the sauce too much or the yogurt and also the cream has a chance to split (that’s probably why Marzia wants you to add some water if the sauce started to bubble rapidly).
– Don’t add too much salt after adding the cream. Yogurt/cream + salt = split.
Hope this helps, remember that this sauce is incredibly hard because of its ingredients, even if you follow these tips there is still a good chance of your sauce getting split. But even if it does, it will still taste delicious, it just doesn’t look as good.
Good luck!
Hi,
I’ve made this recipe exactly per your recipe (came out great!), but I have a question. The recipe says to “thinly slice” the onion…I like to use a food processor for onions. Since you end up blending it anyway, does it really matter how the onion is cut? Thank you in advance!
-Sahar
I slice the onions because it’s the quickest way to cut them and as it exposes more of the onion to the oil and cooks it slightly quicker. Food processing, or dicing the onions might change the cooking time to get the onions translucent by a little bit, but for this recipe, it won’t make a huge difference if you prefer to use your food processor!
First time ever making Butter Chicken and oh my gosh, this recipe is just deeelish! My household loved it! Thankyou for sharing 🙂