Chicken dry fry with grated coconut

I have lived in Karnataka most of my life exempting the last 3 years in Dubai. Back in the days most of Kerala delicacies never crossed the Kerala borders. I lived close to Mangalore and Mangalore is only an arms distance away from Kerala (not literally:P) Despite this, it was a rarity to find any of the Kerala treats in Mangalore region or any neighboring areas. May be if you hunted down, you would find it in some corner of Mangalore unlike today when Kerala food is as popular in these regions. My parents say that after every vacation, when we come back from Kerala we had to lug across cartons filled with fish pickle, mango pickle, ari unda, achappam, ethekka upperi, chakka upperi, aluva, jelebi, puttu podi anything and everything. Now almost all of these are available in Mangalore sparing them the trouble of carrying cartons. My mother even ranted on once about how we managed to put everything into the bus at Mangalore station including me and my dad but before she and my sis who was in her arms would get in, the bus took off from the bus station. She ran behind the bus with a wailing sis in her arms only to find that the bus was simply moving ahead to park in a different area giving space to other buses. The conductor tried shouting out to her in Kannada but yeah we were just learning Kannada back then!

Years on, you find almost everything in Mangalore. You have caterers serving appam, moru curry at functions, Kerala parotta is a hot favorite at hotels and banana chips is made at every nook and cranny!

I remember a time when Kerala parotta and chilly chicken/ beef topped the menu of must eats in Kerala! That brings me to the dish of the day - Chicken dry fry. The idea was basically conceived from BDF - Beef Dry Fry. I tried out something similar with chicken that goes with parotta and instead of adding coconut pieces, I added grated coconut. I loved the results and there it went off to the photography table right after a few pieces went down my food pipe:)

Ingredients

To marinate -

Chicken - 500 gms
Pepper powder - 1/2 tsp
Chilli powder - 2 tsp
Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
Ginger-garlic paste - 2 tsp
Salt to taste

The masala -

Onions - 2 finely chopped
Coconut - 1/2 cup grated
Curry leaves
Garam masala
Salt to taste
Vegetable Oil as needed

Method

Clean and cut the chicken into small pieces. Use the breast part to get boneless pieces. ( Having pieces with bones is also totally fine.)
Marinate the chicken for 30 minutes in pepper powder,chilli powder,turmeric powder and ginger- garlic paste.
Add salt to the marinated chicken. Heat oil in a wide pan. Space out the chicken pieces in the pan and sprinkle some curry leaves.
Rotate the pieces to ensure that it gets cooked well and a good char.
Scoop out the chicken pieces and let excess oil drain off on a kitchen towel.
Into the same oil, add onions and saute until tender. Add garam masala , salt and curry leaves and let the masala get cooked. It takes about a a minute to two.
Finally add the coconut and stir fry till the coconut begins to brown and crisp.
Add the fried chicken pieces and let it coat well in the dry masala. Cook for further two minutes to let the masala coat and run dry.
Although the dish goes well with any sort of roti or even as a standalone, the best pairing would be Kerala Parotta!

You may also note -

You could add either corriander powder or green chilly to the dish. I chose to keep the ingredients minimal.
This dish is on lines of Kerala cuisine and hence I have not used corriander leaves which is a rarity in our cuisine. However, if you like corriander leaves in your dish , you may take it up a notch by adding corriander leaves.

You could also check out other chicken recipes on the blog here!

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