Moghalai-Style Chicken with Spinach, Almonds, and Raisins

We're cooking curries again! And this one is delicious, chunks of chicken simmered in an onion-almond-raisin sauce with a few spices. It takes about 30-40 minutes to put together, much of which is spent simmering or stirring occasionally, so you can use the time to do other things -- prepare a side dish, say, or (as we did) tidy up the spice cupboard and perform laptop surgery.

It calls for Punjabi garam masala; it's very easy to put together, and we previously posted the recipe as part of the Paneer Pizza recipe. We served it over brown rice cooked with cinnamon, star anise, and ghee.

As with all recipes from 660 Curries, we've halved the salt for this writeup, but no other alterations have been made.

Ingredients

• 64mL canola oil
• 1 large red onion (or two yellow onions), finely chopped
• 128mL golden raisins
• 128mL slivered blanched almonds
• 1kg boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into ~2cm chunks
• 15mL Punjabi garam masala
• 5mL coarse salt
• 2.5mL cayenne
• 2.5mL ground turmeric
• 1 package (~300g) fresh baby spinach leaves (or chopped full-size spinach), or thawed frozen spinach

Procedure

1. Heat the oil in a deep skillet (or pot) over medium heat. Add the onions, raisins, and almonds, and cook until the onion softens, the almonds are toasted, and the raisins turn honey-brown and succulent, 10-15 minutes.
2. Stir in the chicken and cook until it sears and turns light brown in places, ~10 minutes.
3. Stir in the spices and cook for 20-30 seconds.
4. Stir in the spinach and 128mL water. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the spinach is wilted and the chicken cooked through, 5-10 minutes.