CHILLI PANEER

Chilli Paneer is an Indo Chinese cuisine made by seasoning fried Indian cottage cheese or paneer cubes in a spicy, sour, sweet, umami chilli sauce. This is a fusion recipe having the best of both Indian and Chinese cooking and a sought after dish in India, south east Asia and Chinese restaurants in India.There are two variations - a dry or semi-dry version and a sauce or gravy based version. A dry version works out positively as a starter while a gravy version works out in a good way as a side dish to fried rice, noodles, bread or roti and so on.

Chili Paneer is a very delicious, spicy and wonderful dish. Once somebody eats this dish, he definitely keeps asking for it again. This chili paneer is also exceptionally  nutritious as it contains numerous kinds of vegetables which is very beneficial for us. It takes a very short time to prepare this recipe. Very less oil is used to prepare this recipe leading to low calorie consumption, which is also significant for our health and  wellbeing.

The fun of eating chilli paneer comes in the winter season. This dish taste delicious  in a Chinese restaurants, however if you want, you can make it magnificent at your own home as you get all the ingredients to make it, at home. With the assistance of the recipe given below, you can prepare a very tasty and delicious chili paneer and make everyone happy.

INGREDIENTS:

For frying paneer

• Paneer (cottage cheese) - 200 to 250 grams
• Cornflour (corn starch) - 3 tablespoons 
• Black pepper powder - ¼ teaspoon
• Red chilli powder - ¼ teaspoon
• Salt - ¼ teaspoon or as required
• Soy sauce - ½ teaspoon
• Oil for frying paneer - 6 - 7 tablespoons or as required

For mixing sauces

• Soy sauce - 1 tablespoon
• Red chilli sauce - 1 teaspoon
• Green chilli sauce - 1 teaspoon 
• Red chilli powder - ¼ teaspoon
• Black pepper powder - ¼ teaspoon
• Rice vinegar/White vinegar /Apple cider vinegar - 1 teaspoon 

For starch paste

• Cornflour (corn starch) - 1 tablespoon 
• Water - 2 tablespoons 

Other ingredients

• Oil (sesame oil or sunflower oil) - 2 tablespoons
• Onions - 2, medium
• Green chillies - 3 to 4
• Ginger - 1 inch
• Garlic - 7 - 8 cloves, medium
• Capsicum - 1, medium
• Celery - 1 to 2 teaspoons, finely chopped (optional)
• Water or vegetable stock - ½ cup
• Sugar - ½ to 1 teaspoon or as required
• Black pepper powder - ¼ teaspoon or as required
• Salt - As required
• Spring onion greens or scallion greens - 1 to 2 tablespoons finely chopped
  

PROCEDURE:

Frying paneer

1. Pat dry the paneer first. Then slice the paneer in cubes or rectangles. 
2. In a mixing bowl take paneer cubes. Add the corn starch, red chilli powder, black pepper powder, salt and soy sauce. Gently mix without breaking the cubes. 
3. Heat oil for frying in a frying pan or kadai. When the oil becomes hot, add the paneer cubes. 
4. When one side is light golden, turn over and fry the second side. Then turn over and continue to fry till all sides become light golden. 
5. Remove fried paneer cubes and place them on kitchen paper towels.

Making starch slurry

1. In a small bowl add corn starch and water. Mix very well.
2. You  will need this corn starch paste to give a glaze to the sauce.

Mixing sauces

1. In another small bowl take soy sauce, red chilli sauce , green chilli sauce, red chilli powder, black pepper powder, white vinegar. 
2. Mix very well and keep aside.

Making chilli paneer 

1. Peel and finely chop ginger and garlic cloves. Diagonally chop green chillies. Quarter the onions and remove all the layers. Slice capsicum in squares. Remove its seeds and pith (white part). Keep the chopped veggies aside. 
2. Add oil in a frying pan and let the oil become hot. Add the finely chopped ginger, garlic and green chillies. Stir.
3. Then add the onion and capsicum squares. If using celery, you can add chopped celery at this step. 
4. On a medium flame, stir fry till the edges of the onions and capsicum get cooked or become light browned.
5. Now add the premixed sauce mixture. Then add 1/2 cup water, little salt and sugar. Add salt carefully, as the sauces already have a salt in them. 
6. Stir very well. Let the mixture come to a simmer on medium to medium-high flame.
7. Now add the corn starch paste. Stir again very well so that no lumps are formed. Do check the taste and add some soy sauce or chilli sauce or sugar or salt if required. 
8. Mix very well and simmer till the sauce has slightly thickened and the corn starch has cooked.
9. Now add the pan-fried paneer cubes. Stir and mix the paneer cubes with the rest of the sauce.
10. Garnish it with some coriander leaves or chopped celery or spring onion greens. 
11. Serve chilli paneer hot as a side with noodles or fried rice or dinner rolls or steamed rice or naan or bread or roti.Chilli Paneer dryChilli Paneer with gravy

NOTE:

• In a restaurant the entire seasoning is made in a Chinese woke on a very high flame which lends a unique smoky flavour. So it is little hard to recreate the same flavour at home.
• It is best to add homemade paneer in the recipe. But if short of time then you can also use a good quality store brought paneer. Make sure the paneer is fresh and soft. You can even use malai paneer.
• If using frozen paneer, then keep them soaked in hot water for some minutes before slicing.
• You can add 1 teaspoon of ginger garlic paste to the corn starch mixture while frying paneer to have a restaurant style taste.
• You can shallow fry or pan fry or deep fry the paneer cubes. Do not fry for too long as then paneer becomes dense and hard.
• To save time, you can skip frying paneer cubes and add them directly to the sauce.
• To veganize the recipe, you can use tofu instead of paneer.
• Instead of onions, you can also use spring onions (scallions).
• Potato starch, corn starch / cornflour  and tapioca starch are the three thickeners you can use in the recipe for thickening the sauce. 
• You can make the gravy thick or having medium consistency as per your choice. If serving with rice, then the gravy or sauce can be medium to medium-thin. If the gravy has become too thick, then add some veg stock or water to thin it down. If serving as starter the sauce can be slightly thick. To make the gravy or sauce more thick, add less water.

Have you tried this "Chilli Paneer" recipe? Please feed us with your comments below.