Chicken on the Fly (!)

Homemade chicken with spicy Indian flavours - 3 step grilled chicken!

Step 1:

Wash small, thawed chicken and cut in half. Drain all water and keep aside.
If the chicken is larger, make a few cuts (without cutting into pieces) to let the masala seep in properly.

The 'Cornish hen' in American supermarkets tastes great! Folks in India, get smallest whole chicken you can find (fresh / frozen; think Godrej chicken, < 1 kg)

Step 2:

In a bowl, mix ginger garlic paste, red chilli powder, turmeric, salt and chopped coriander (cilantro / dhania).  Beaten yoghurt is optional. 

Cover chicken evenly with this paste. Let it stand for 5 mins. Preheat oven till then (~ 350°F).

Step 3:

Place chicken on grill rack with a tray / baking dish below to catch drippings.

Set timer for 30 mins initially.

After 30 mins, flip over and set for another 10 - 15 mins.

Check if done - meat should be tender and should cut easily.

Add 10 mins at a time and keep checking (no need to flip over each time!)

Cooking time will depend on size of chicken and oven used.

When done, add a squeeze of lemon and dig in!

Toaster-ovens can perfectly fit a small chicken. You could as well use a regular oven if cooking a larger bird or if you don't have a table-top oven.

Hope you have a great weekend lunch, catching up on your favourite series online while savouring this!

borrowed time - re-imagine, re-live!

curiosity. it is at the heart of human exploration. since when did we start banking more on simplicity, security and peace of mind while slowly giving up and finally trading in excitement, thrill and adventure almost completely? since when did we switch to searching for adventure in life instead of the other way 'round? throughout adolescence we are taught to make tough choices - but all within the relative safety and comfort of well established bounds and guidelines. anything out of the ordinary is coined as rebellious. how long do we have to shun the rebel before expanding the acceptable boundaries to include these; and in doing so define new boundaries...? 

we live and breathe our passions on borrowed time. time borrowed from more pressing urgency - the urgency to live. "no time to stand and stare..." - very aptly said indeed. at the dawn of civilization, we struggled to sustain. then, at the peak of prosperity, we explored new worlds. satisfied the innate hunger for curiosity and adventure. today we simply sustain; arguably very comfortably, which of course comes at the price of toiling away for the most chunk of our day. we drown our passions in the hope of living them in some distant tomorrow. of course, there needs to be a balance between weaving a good base for a comfortable life and taking the time to actually live that life to the fullest. either extremes on their own are disastrous; but more often than not we find people around us everywhere who have terribly lost that balance. 

step back for a moment and find that balance.