Tandoori Mixed Grill

What Tandoori Mixed Grill is

A tandoori platter brings together chicken tikka and seekh kebab, charred at the edges and served on a sizzling plate with raw onion and lime. The marinade is yoghurt-based, which does two things at once: the acid tenderises, and the milk solids cling to the meat and blacken, giving the characteristic spotted char.

Dietary: Contains dairyGluten-free

Allergens: Dairy

Where it comes from

Tandoor cooking is ancient across Central and South Asia, but the restaurant tandoori platter is a twentieth-century invention, popularised in Delhi and then everywhere. The oven works by radiant heat from clay walls at 400°C or more, which cooks a skewer in minutes — far faster and drier than any grill, which is why tandoori meat is charred outside and still juicy inside.

How to eat it

Squeeze the lime over everything before you start — the platter is rich and the acid is part of the design, not a garnish. Eat the raw onion rings between pieces rather than all at once; they clear the palate. Tandoori meat is a starter in most restaurants, eaten with green chutney and no bread, before the curries arrive. If it comes on a sizzling plate, give it thirty seconds to stop spitting.

Goes well with

• Mint and coriander chutney
• Sliced onion with lemon
• A cold lassi

Ingredients

• 500 g Boneless chicken thigh, cubed
• 400 g Minced lamb, for the seekh
• 200 g Thick yoghurt — Hung or strained; watery yoghurt will not cling.
• 3 tbsp Ginger-garlic paste
• 2 tsp Kashmiri chilli powder — For the red colour without punishing heat.
• 1 tsp each Garam masala and cumin powder
• 2 tbsp Gram flour — Binds the seekh mince so it holds on the skewer.
• 3 tbsp Mustard oil
• 2 tbsp Lemon juice
• 1 Red onion, sliced into rings
• to serve Green chutney

How to cook it

1. 1Strain the yoghurt first

   Hang the yoghurt in a cloth for an hour, or use thick Greek-style. Watery yoghurt runs off the meat in the oven and takes the spices with it, leaving pale, steamed chicken.

2. 2Marinate the chicken twice

   First rub the cubes with lemon juice, salt and half the ginger-garlic paste for twenty minutes, then coat in the yoghurt mixed with the remaining paste, chilli, garam masala and mustard oil. Refrigerate four hours or more.

3. 3Bind the seekh mince

   Mix the lamb with gram flour, grated onion squeezed dry, chopped chilli and spices, then knead it hard for several minutes. Unlike momo filling, seekh mince needs working — that is what makes it stick to the skewer rather than dropping off.

4. 4Rest the mince before shaping

   Chill the kneaded mince for thirty minutes, then press it along flat skewers with wet hands into even sausages.

5. 5Cook at the highest heat you have

   In a domestic oven, use the grill element at maximum with the shelf near the top, or a very hot cast-iron pan. Turn once. You are aiming for black spots, not an even brown — an evenly coloured tikka has been cooked too gently and will be dry.

6. 6Finish with smoke, if you want it

   Place a small bowl in the pan with a lit piece of charcoal, pour a teaspoon of ghee over it and cover for two minutes. This dhungar method is how home cooks imitate the tandoor's smoke.

Calories and nutrition

Per serving — 1 mixed platter (about 320 g)

Approximate values for a typical restaurant portion, calculated from standard ingredient tables. Actual figures vary with the kitchen, the oil used and the portion served. Not intended as medical or dietary advice.

Other dishes to read about

• Chicken Momo — Nepal's steamed dumpling, eaten by hand with a bowl of sesame-tomato achar.
• Veg Momo — The vegetarian momo, where the filling has to be seasoned harder to carry itself.
• Butter Chicken — Tandoori chicken finished in a tomato and cream gravy — mild, and deliberately so.
• Lamb Curry — Bone-in lamb cooked slowly until the sauce thickens around it.
• Chicken Biryani — Rice and marinated chicken layered raw, then sealed and steamed together.
• Mutton Biryani — The same method as chicken biryani, but the meat sets the timing.