Healthy Chicken Bhuna

This is another of the recipes from The Hairy Dieters – Eat For Life and the first I’ve tried in their “Fakeaways” section. The idea is to replicate the takeaway taste with just a fraction of the calories, and this recipe uses hardly any fat at all – just a tablespoon of oil. The book says that it works out at around 305 calories per portion, or 9 weight watchers pro points, which is pretty good for a curry. Remember though you need to add to that any rice or sides you serve with it – I went for a portion of brown rice.How to make the curry:

1. Create a basic curry paste by blending 2 onions, 40g peeled fresh ginger, 2 tsp curry powder, 2 tsp garam masala and 1/2 tsp chilli powder in a food processor.
2. Heat and often the paste in a frying pan in 1 tbsp oil, and then add in 400g tinned chopped tomatoes. Heat through for a couple of minutes.
3. Add in 4 diced chicken breasts and 2 chopped peppers. Add 600ml vegetable or chicken stock made with 1 stock cube, plus 1 tbsp sugar, and bring to a simmer. Cook for 20 minutes.
4. Mix 1 tbsp cornflower with 2 tbsp water to create a paste, and then stir into to the curry to thicken it. Stir for another couple of minutes until ready to serve.

So my thoughts on this recipe are that it didn’t fool me – it tastes nothing like a real takeaway Bhuna. They’d probably have been better off not calling it a Bhuna at all so as not to disappoint! But still, it was a pretty tasty curry, very filling, and fairly guilt free, so I’d definitely make it again for a weekday meal. I’ll also try some of their other low-cal curries to see what they’re like. And I am still loving these Hairy Dieters books – I’m yet to try a recipe that hasn’t been tasty and filling!