Food talk
Chicken champ

Lasuni khushk murg will leave you yearning for more, writes Pushpesh Pant

IN music there are certain symphonies that are played in a single dominant key and the melody created is often superb. Something like this also happens when food is prepared imaginatively — using a single ingredient — often a spice or a flavouring agent like a prominent musical note.

A good example of this is adraki champe or dhaniwaal murg. Ajwaini machli and methi keema are also delicacies that follow the same route. We were introduced to the lasuni murg parche by our good friend Mohammad Farooq quite some time back while dining in Lucknow. Somehow, the dish, delectable as it was, left us yearning for more.

The Nawabs of Awadh preferred everything boneless — fish, foul or flesh but we have friends for whom meat is synonymous with haddi. In Punjab as is well known, the tangri is particularly valued. Raminder Malhotra at Swaad in Old Rajinder Nagar used to dangle a seductive leg (of chicken, lest you get us wrong) to make his patrons drool.

This was a superbly spiced stuffed tandoori kebab — robust snack to pair with a peg. The question that would not let us rest has been can the lasun magic be replicated without the Lakhnavi nazaqat? We have finally jumped in where the proverbial angels fear to tread and tried to emulate the master chef by preparing lasuni murgh not with boneless breasts but with regular chicken curry cut-bones and all. No cumbersome marination either. Good old garlic goes a long way and it is not only the comic character Yogi Bear who loves it; our family doctor too prescribes it in pearl form.

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