Healthy Food - Chicken with yogurt, anyone?

I don't know what it is about chicken dishes that make all my children so crazy about it.
The greatest chicken lover was my son. When he was eight years old, we decided to abstain from buying chicken for a month so he could learn to appreciate other types of food. The media was busy warning the public that commercially bred chicken were injected with growth inducer which could potentially cause cancer.
Well to my son removing chicken from his plate was a catastrophe. No chicken no food. He decided to abstain from eating any type of healthy food except for biscuits and junk food during the first week of the trial period. He never complained but quietly fight us by eating biscuits and junk food which he purchased from the school canteen.

Perhaps we were both 'jelly' parents (not firm enough with him); but we could not stand to see him hungry and deprived of his favourite food. So in the 2nd week, the chicken came back in - but without the skin and the fats (which were supposed to be the cancer-causing parts) and of course the head, the feet and other frightening looking organs we could not consume - except for the liver and the gizzard. The funny part is, there is very little of the chicken left once you remove all the fats.

Now, 15 years later we have a choice of either the regular chicken or 'kampung' (village) chicken. Of course the village chicken becomes most people's choice because there is no cancer threat to it; the meat is firm with the normal amount of animal fats; and so, so delicious when cooked.

The best chicken recipe I have so far is the 'chicken yogurt with tomato'.
This was taught to me by a Pakistani friend, Lubna, and I really thank her for this great recipe.
It is not difficult to cook, not only delicious, but healthy as well.

The recipe is as below:

Marinate
1 whole chicken cut into 8 to 12 pieces.
350gms yogurt
300gms tomato puree

Ingredients to fry:
4 tbs vegetable oil
2 large onions (diced)
4 garlics (chopped)
5 cm ginger (finely chopped)
1/2 lemon ( sliced )
2 green chillies ( sliced)
1 lemon grass (crushed)

Spices
1 to 2 tbs chilli powder
2 cinnamon sticks
5 cloves
1 tsp cummin powder
1 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp fenugreek powder
1 tsp chilli powder
Salt and pepper

Method
The Chicken:
1. Clean the chicken and marinate with the yogurt and tomato puree.
(Put aside for 30 minutes or more - the longer the better)
2. To cook, put into a deep pot and leave to boil on slow fire.

Ingredients to fry ( separately from the chicken)
1. Heat the oil in a wok.
2. When the oil is hot, put in the sliced onions.
3. Fry the onions until it turns dark brown and crispy.
4. Add in the chilli powder and fry until it turns dark red gives out a beautiful aroma.
5. Add in the ginger and lemon grass.
6. Add the sliced lemon and fry until it turns brown and slightly dry.
6. Add in the rest of the spices and garlic.
7. Add in the green chillies and fry until slightly soft,
8. Add salt and pepper.

Final step ( The marriage of two exotic friends.....)

9. Lift the wok, pour the fried ingredients into the boiling chicken.
10. Let the sauce thicken and bled with the chicken.
11. If you like what you just tried, remove from the fire and serve.

(serves 6 to 8)

Usually we eat this with rice and fresh 'cucumber and tomato salad'.

Recipe for the salad

1. Place diced cucumber, sliced (small) onions, chopped tomatos, a little sliced carrots in a bowl.
2. Stir with 1 tbs vinegar
3. Add sliced chillies
4. Add 1 tsp brown sugar ( if you want it to be a little sweet)
5. Salt and pepper.
6. Serve.

Note: The important part about getting the taste right is to be patient with the stages of waiting for the onions to turn really dark brown and for the lemon lices to dry up; before proceeding with the next action.

Happy feasting!