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Chicken Tikka Masala is one of our favorite Indian dishes of all time. Tender chicken in a creamy, flavorful, tomato sauce is so easy to make at home. A must try!
Featured with this Recipe
Chicken Tikka Masala first came into our lives years ago while we were living in California and some dear friends made it for us. Later we tried the same dish at an Indian Restaurant called The Bombay House in Provo, Utah. This recipe tastes exactly the same! Warm, creamy, and slightly spicy, this signature Indian meal can be made at home with ingredients and spices that you may already have in your kitchen! You can have an authentic Indian dinner in minutes without ordering take-out or spending a fortune at a restaurant.
Ingredients in Chicken Tikka Masala
Marinade
- Yogurt – not Greek yogurt, just regular plain yogurt
- Lemon Juice
- Cumin
- Cinnamon
- Garam Masala
- Cayenne Pepper
- Ground Pepper
- Fresh Ginger
- Salt
Chicken Tikka Masala
- Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts – you can also use boneless skinless chicken thighs, you can also use other protein like shrimp
- Butter
- Garlic Cloves
- Cumin
- Paprika
- Garam Masala
- Chili Powder
- Salt
- Tomato Sauce
- Heavy Cream
- Fresh Cilantro
- Optional Sides – naan bread, basmati rice, raita
Chicken Tikka Masala History
The dish Chicken Tikka Masala gained popularity in an Indian restaurant in Glasgow, Scotland of all places, even though it was originally created in India. The Ali family who owned the restaurant came up with the creamy chicken recipe in the 1970s and word has it that it went on to become the most popular dish in British restaurants.
The chicken is first marinated in yogurt and spices, and then grilled on skewers. The next step is to add the chicken to the perfectly seasoned, creamy tomato sauce. We love that it is mild enough for our kids to enjoy, but spicy enough for the adults. If you’re looking to broaden your dinner horizons, try this recipe; you will love it!
Garam Masala
You’ll notice garam masala is listed as an ingredient in this Chicken Tikka Masala recipe. If you’ve never heard of garam masala, it is a ground spice blend traditionally used in Northern Indian dishes. When purchased, the blend can include cardamom, ground coriander, cumin, cinnamon, cloves, pepper, and turmeric. You can also make your own garam masala blend, but it won’t taste the same if you just mix use a mix of these powdered spices. Garam masala is so flavorful because the whole spices or seeds are first toasted before they are grounded and blended together. This brings out the the richest flavor and fragrance in the spices.
What to Serve with Chicken Tikka Masala
For a delicious Indian dinner, serve Chicken Tikka Masala over a bed of rice with warm naan bread or a simple green salad. You can also try a few of these tasty sides:
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, place the chicken skewers on a baking sheet lined with foil. Place on the top rack and broil at 390 degrees for 20 minutes, turning once.
Tikka Masala is a tomato based sauce that is creamy, earthy, and spicy.
This recipe is not spicy at all. You can make it more spicy by adding cayenne pepper.
Read Next: 35+ Quick and Easy To Follow Dinner Ideas Your Family Will Surely Love
More Chicken Dinner Recipes
Need a little variety to your chicken dinners? Try these delicious chicken meals:
- Chicken Massaman Curry
- Coconut Curry Grilled Chicken
- Chicken Panang Curry
- Chicken Satay with Peanut Sauce and Cool Cucumber Salad
- Jared’s General Tso’s Chicken
How to Make Chicken Tikka Masala
Chicken Tikka Masala
Video
Ingredients
Marinade:
- 1 cup yogurt
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 2 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon garam masala
- 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
- 1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts cut into bite-size pieces
- 5 wooden skewers
Sauce:
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 clove garlic minced
- 2 teaspoon ground cumin
- 2 teaspoon paprika
- 1 teaspoon garam masala (optional)
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 8 ounces tomato sauce
- 1 cup heavy cream
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
Optional Sides:
- 6 pieces Naan Bread
- 3 cups rice cooked
- 1 cup cucumber yogurt (see recipe HERE)
Instructions
For the Marinade
- In a large bowl, combine yogurt, lemon juice, cumin, cinnamon, garam masala, cayenne, pepper, ginger, and salt. Stir in chicken, cover, refrigerate 1 hour.
- Preheat a grill for high heat. Lightly oil the grill grate. Thread chicken onto skewers and discard marinade.
- Grill chicken skewers 5 minutes on each side.
For the Sauce
- Melt butter in a large skillet or dutch oven over medium heat. Saute garlic for 1 minute.
- Season with cumin, paprika, garam masala, chili powder, and salt. Stir in tomato sauce and cream. Simmer on medium low heat until sauce thickens, about 20 minutes.
- Add grilled chicken to the sauce, and simmer for 5 more minutes.
- Sprinkle with fresh chopped cilantro. Serve with rice, naan bread, and cucumber yogurt.
Notes
- I am not a fan of onions, so I didn’t include them in this recipe. However, you can add a diced yellow onion and saute it with the garlic.
- Want Chicken Tikka Masala on the table quicker? Try our Instant Pot Chicken Tikka Masala recipe.
- For a more authentic taste, use a can of full fat coconut milk instead of heavy cream.
First off, this has been a family favorite of ours for years, so thank you for posting it.
I was wondering, can this meal be frozen?
Yes it should freeze great!
MAGNIFICENT AWESOME TREMENDOUS DELICIOUS……A CROWD PLEASER
AMAZING…AND PHENOMENAL
DELICIOUS BEYOND MEASURE
This recipe looks too dry with too little sauce dip into or blanket over basmati rice which is the traditional way of enjoying this dish. Also, where are the onions??? Diced onions slowly sauteed until caramelized is a hallmark of indian recipes which is painfully missing here. Means you are not bringing out and optimizing the full favors of the spice mix and results in a blander taste, why bother going through all that cooking and end up with a mediocre dish?
Hi! If you look in the notes of the recipe you’ll see that we left the onions out because of dietary preferences specific to our family, but we provide instructions for adding them.
We added a pepper and onion to the sauce, and broiled the chicken instead of grilling but this was the best tikka masala recipe ever, our 2.5 year old daughter loved it too!!! Thank you so much for sharing.
going to try it at home love Indian food, i have all the goodies to make it with. 80 years young love to cook too.
This is by far my family’s favorite meal and I share it with everyone I know! Anytime I ask for dinner suggestions this is what everyone requests. I usually don’t prep ahead of time enough for it or forget to buy at least 1 ingredient, but it s always turns out great. I don’t ever grill the chicken, I just throw it in the broiler or toaster oven on broil for a little bit.
Loving the flavors!! Bold & tasty! Great over rice or pasta!
One of the most flavorful meals!!! Wasn’t too spicy for my family & they are already asking when I’ll make it again!
This was the most flavorful dish ever! The combination of spices worked so well together! My entire family enjoyed this meal! Making it again soon!
Thanks a lot for sharing this masala recipe! Really delicious!
I loved the original recipe you had for this but lost it! Can I please get the recipe that you had before? It didn’t have garam masala. It has been a family favorite for years and years and we loved it!
Hi! We are so glad you love the recipe! The only thing we changed is adding the garam masala, and that is optional. You can follow the recipe exactly, and just leave that out. Hope this helps!
Excellent! Made it exactly as written. Made fresh naan bread to go with it. Mmm.
Due to this virus “storm”, I’ve been craving something more exotic than our usual and had saved this recipe. Even my country boy, meat and potatoes kind of guy loved it! There were a couple of changes, due to us not shopping often these days: tomato purée instead of sauce, no hot pepper (used extra black), no paprika, and no grilling. After marinading, I dumped the chicken and marinade into a hot skillet, turning the meat til it was done, and then put all of that into the sauce. It would have been perfect if only we had had some naan!
Thanks so much for the recipe!
Is their a substitute for the heavy cream? Half and half or milk maybe? Heavy cream upsets some of our tummies 😥
Thanks In Advance
Absolutely! Half and half or milk is totally fine. You can also add some Greek yogurt if you need to thicken it up. Hope this helps!
My husband and I LOVE this recipe. We just got an instant pot for christmas so I was curious; Have you tried to make this in an instant pot yet? I’m curious as to how it would turn out and how you’d do it!
I like your thinking! We will put it on our list of recipes to make in the future. I will experiment around and see what I come up with. Keep checking back 🙂
Ok, so I am about 6 years late to this party…but THANK YOU for this recipe!! This is one of my family’s favorite dinners!! I love that it doesn’t call for Garam masala, which is not easy to find in my area. I have many Indian restaurants in my area, but it’s nice to have an inexpensive option that I can make at home (and that isn’t spicy for the kiddos).
It’s never too late to comment! 🙂 So glad you like it!!
Is it possible to use anything in place of the yogurt? Lactose allergy… thanks
I don’t know what would be a good substitute– you could probably just leave it out if you need to!
This is a super easy and yummy recipe! I add Curry powder to it and it adds to the flavor! Thank you!
Making this tonight.. problem is i dont have cumin powder.. i dont know how it’ll turn out but i will let you know
Hopefully it will still be ok, let us know how it turns out!
Mine is in the final stage of cooking and the aroma is amazing! Can’t wait to eat!
Delicious!!
We love Indian foods and this really tasty. I made it pretty close. I added some cauliflower to the chicken/marinade and broiled both (didn’t feel like going out to the grill). I also added some chopped onion to the sauce, thought about a bell pepper but forgot. I tossed some turmeric in the marinade and a little cinnamon in the sauce.
Such an easy-to-make and tasty dinner. We have awesome lunches tomorrow
Oh adding cauliflower is a wonderful idea! Good thinking! So glad you liked it!
This recipe is nearly identical to a recipe on allrecipes that I love. I have several recipes on your site that I love, but you never seem to give credit where credit is due.
Sorry Katie, this recipe actually came from my cousin’s wife, which was a family recipe of hers. I’m sure that we have many recipes that are going to look similar to others online just due to the fact that there are a lot of similar recipes out there. Most of our recipes are from our family or ones that we have created. If we do use another online recipe as a resource we always credit them back. We have been posting for almost 8 years now and when we update a recipe it pushes the date up, so some of the ones you may be seeing online are copies of our originals too.
Hi I used your coconut korma recipe and it was amazing!! My boyfriend asks for it at least once a week! I want to try out this recipe but I’m from the uk and we don’t have cans of tomato sauce here! I know this was posted a long time ago so not sure if I’ll get a reply but any idea what I can use as a substitute? Thanks!
Hi Leah- Do you have tomato paste? Send me an email at contact [at] favfamilyrecipes [dot] com and I can try to help you figure you a way to make this recipe a success for you!
Excellent tikka masala recipe. I’ve tried a few others, lost hope then the hubby requested Indian food this evening. I followed the recipe to a “t” but cooked my chicken under the broiler. Delicious. Paired it with cauliflower rice for a wonderful low carb meal. Thank you for posting this will become a staple in our home.
Thank you!!! I love your idea with the cauliflower rice! yum!
And the spice level here tastes like the mild version of their Tikka Masala? Bc I don’t do great with spicy foods, but I LOVE their Tikka Masala (mild).
WOW what a recipe! I’ve made this like 3 times now since I found it. But I have to say I didn’t like white boneless chicken (when we eat out, we found it usually dry and bland), so I used bone in pieces and it tasted AAAAAmazing!!!!! My husband loves Indian Food, and since we’ve been having two little kiddies, eating out is more of a nuisance than an enjoyment so I started looking up recipes of our favorite Indian dishes. So far this is a definite keeper! Thank you for sharing. Because of this recipe I don’t feel like Indian cooking is a mystery nor is it beyond my reach anymore 🙂
I tried your recipe last night with my family. I’ve been an avid fan of food from the Bombay House, and I’ve spent that last two or three years learning to cook Indian Food. Your recipe was really good and my kids really enjoyed it. It’s simple and something you can do from home. However… it did NOT taste exactly like the Bombay House version. I’m not sure if that’s even possible, but I’m pretty particular in specificity. This was a great sauce, might even taste better, but it wasn’t the same. For one thing, I know the Bombay House includes Bell Peppers and Onions in their sauce (it says right on the menu). Great job though, I am going to be trying a lot more of your recipes and endorsing you to other chefs!
I know, I left the onions out on purpose because I hate them. 🙂
This is just the BEST chicken tikka masala I have ever eaten and, as it is my very favorite Indian dish, I have tried it all over the world. SO grateful to have found a recipe that I can make at home that tastes authentic. Thank you, ladies!!
Thank you for a delicious recipe! Made it tonight and me whole family loved it.
I love indian food! this is amazing! I love Bombay House (I’ve only tried the one in SLC), but I love spicy indican food, so my question would be, what spice, chili, do they use to make it hot? is it just cayenne pepper? I would love to try it, but all my family would request spice! I know it, and I am going to try to prepare Naan, basmati rice so we have the whole experience. Thanks!
If you want to kick up the spice, you can add red pepper flakes, but I would use siracha hot sauce.
This looks amazing! Just wondering how many this recipe serves. Thanks!
This serves about 4 to 6, depending on serving sizes.
Initially saw this recipe pinned and thought I had to try it! I made it last week and it was so delicious! Thanks for the great recipe. I am now looking for more!
This is the first time I’ve grilled chicken (I’ve made a point of not knowing how to do it so my husband would have to make dinner sometimes…) : ) but I got tired of waiting to have this recipe and did it myself.
So, here’s my question: Was the chicken supposed to cook all the way through on the grill, or does it finish cooking while it is in the simmering sauce for 10 minutes?
Thank you so much for your website! I LOATHE cooking dinner night after night after night after night and you guys make it bearable (and even fun — don’t tell)!
SO YUMMY!!! Third recipe I’ve made from your site and all three were a home run! I’m so excited to make more!! Thank you so much for all your hard work. We LOVED the change of pace with this indian dish.
Hummm, vou tentar esta receita, amo comida indiana e os ingredientes tenho todos aqui em casa. Vou depois olhar com carinho seu blog, ele promete coisas deliciosas, agora vou levar a neta para a escola.
Um abraço.
What kind of tomato sauce do you use? I’ve seen recipes for crushed tomatoes but just want to make sure I’m in line with all these rave reviews!
I am pretty sure I just used a regular can of Hunt’s tomato sauce, nothing fancy!
Sounds good, thank you! I’m looking forward to making it tonight!
Made this exactly as directed and it was AMAZING!! We love it and will be making it for friends real soon. One word…OUTTADAPARK!! Thank you!!
i live in an apartment and cannot grill the chicken. any ideas on how to prepare this dish without grilling the chicken?? thanks
Instead of grilling, just cook the chicken pieces in a skillet until lightly browned. I have done this when it was raining and I didn’t want to go outside to grill, it still tasted great!
Awesome recipe, had my picky eater asking for seconds.
I assume yogurt means plain low-fat non-flavored yogurt. Anyone try it with plain low-fat greek yogurt?
That’s all I have in the kitchen and I want to try this recipe tonight.
Yes, it is plain yogurt. I have used plain greek yogurt and it works great!
Thanks for the reply back. I trust you and am cooking the dish right now! 🙂
This looks good, I’m going to try it tonight. Love all of your recipes that I’ve tried and your site. I did find it interesting that there is no curry in this recipe. We lived in the West Indies for 4 years and had wonderful Indian food, and I always assumed that the Indian flavor came from the curry. Any thoughts???
All the spices together give it an indian curry taste, it is more authentic than using curry powder.
@Bethany- You will love this dish. It is a rich, savory dish.. I know many Indian dishes call for curry but not this one. It doesn’t have the sweet flavor that curry typically brings and it just works with Tikka Masala. This is one of our very favorite dishes–my husband requests it all the time!
I love love LOVE this recipe. It is now in our regular dinner rotation.
Just made this and it far and away the best Indian recipe I have made at home. It was really easy and so tasty! Will definitely make this again!
I made this for my family a couple of nights ago and it was amazing! Even my 2-year-old was eating it. I just stumbled across your web site a week or so ago, but I have a very long list of new meals to try. Thanks!
@Melissa-
I wish there were a "like" button here because I would "like" your comment. In fact. I love it! Thanks so much! I am glad it turned out great for you!
Erica
I made this for the in-laws, and I warned them befoe-hand not to judge me when I licked the plate clean. This is so so so so so good. I've tried a bunch of different Tikka Masala recipes, hoping to satisfy my craving for Bombay House Tikka Masala, and this was PERFECT. I'll never have to go to Bombay House again! (plus, I don't live in Utah anymore… sad for me…) Not to toot my own horn, but I even made Naan for this dish. The Naan was also delicious, but my pizza stone cracked while making it! Sad day for me, but not too sad since I still had the tikka masala to make it all better. Thank you for sharing!
Made this for dinner and loved it!!!! Can't wait to have it again. Are you still going to post the recipe for Coconut Kurma? Would love to try it as well! Thanks for all the yummy recipes.
I actually do have the recipe for the Chicken Coconut Kurma!!! Coming soon! Keep watching….
I love Bombay House! Do you have any idea how to make the Chicken Coconut Kurma from Bombay House?! I would love to duplicate that recipe!! Thanks! I love your blog!
That's it I'm making this tomorrow. Love the Bombay House in Provo and there's no Indian restaurants in Fairbanks, Alaska.
I used to travel to Provo, UT at least once a month for work and LOVED the Bombay House.
I recently posted that EXACT recipe on my blog. I will vouch that it's AMAZING!
My husband lived in the West Indies for two years and knows his Indian fare. He has declared this recipe the best chicken he has ever had 🙂
Mmm, I love the Bombay House!