Tandoori Chicken; Palak Paneer

I don't tend to make Indian food very often, as I don't think I'm very good at it. But I recently got some Tandoori seasoning in a Penzey's spice order, so I thought I'd give it a whirl. None of these dishes are particularly "authentic," but they were pretty tasty. At least evidenced by rob eating 2 plates of it.

For the chicken, I basically just followed the recipe on the spice container: made a marinade of 1 cup plain yogurt (Greek-style), 1 Tbl of the Tandoori seasoning, and the juice of half a lime.

I had a package of 6 chicken legs. Most tandoori recipes I looked at said to skin the chicken before marinating, but...after wrassling with the first drumstick and getting covered in raw chicken goo, I decided to forget that. Besides, chicken skin is tasty. Seasoned the chicken with salt, then stuck it in a plastic bag with the marinade, squooshed it up and put it in the fridge for about 4 hours. Then wiped off the excess marinade, put the drumsticks on a wire rack over a sheet pan, drizzled with a little bit of olive oil, ground some black pepper over, and baked at 400 for about 45 minutes. I flipped the pieces halfway through and then broiled the skin side at the end for just a bit.

 I looked at a bunch of recipes for Palak Paneer (or Saag Paneer; not really sure what the difference is). As usual, conglomerated them into my own creation. Though it seems like paneer isn't really too hard to make yourself, I'd read that Queso Fresco is a good substitute, and that was readily available at my local Safeway.

I started by cutting the Queso Fresco into cubes and browning it in a pan with a little butter and oil. Except...it started to melt pretty quickly, so I really didn't brown it. Not sure if the Queso is more melty, but it definitely did not turn a beautiful golden brown like the pics in most of the recipes. In any case, I removed it to a plate. Rest of the recipe went something like:

• Finely chop one onion, 3 cloves of garlic, 1 jalapeno (with seeds) and a 1-inch piece of ginger (I grated that on a microplane).
• Saute these in a little veg. oil & butter until softened.
• Add about 1 tsp each garam masala, cumin & coriander, plus a little salt. Cook about 1 minute.
• Add a large bag of frozen chopped spinach, thawed. Cook a few minutes.
• Reduce heat and add 1 cup plain Greek yogurt. I also added about 1/2 cup of water as it looked pretty thick. Most recipes tell you to puree the spinach in a food processor at this point, but I didn't bother. I think I added a good bit more salt and some more garam masala at this point.
• Add in the paneer cubes and simmer for a few minutes. I added some chopped cilantro at the end.

 
This made a ton!! Despite it looking like...a pile of green goo (which I think is the point), it was pretty good. Not necessarily Indian-restaurant-good, but...OK for a white girl.

Instead of rice, I served this with Trader Joe's "Teeny Tiny Potatoes" (which we call Screaming Potatoes, because when you take them out of the oven they emit a subtle high-pitched scream...seriously!). I tossed them with olive oil, salt and some more of the Tandoori seasoning. Should have used more of that as they weren't particularly spicy. Put these in the oven with the chicken at about the 20 minute mark.

Now I gotta get through leftovers of this as well as the pasta e fagioli...poor me!