Vide Rationale

I don’t know about you, but I love me some great cutlets. Unfortunately, I live in North Bangalore, and the ones we get here simply don’t even come close to the ones from home (Kerala). I had to take matters into my own hands and create the perfect cutlets myself.

Here’s the recipe.

Step 1: Take ~250 grams or two medium-sized potatoes, cut them into two or more pieces each, and fully submerge them in water inside a pressure cooker. Heat on a stove and wait for three whistles, after which you keep it aside until all the steam has left. The potatoes should come out squishy, but not too soft. Mash it with a spoon or whatever other appropriate utensils you have. The consistency should be somewhat thicker than the mashed potato you get in restaurants. Keep it aside and let it cool.

Step 2: Boil ~250 grams of boneless chicken with half a cup water. Add salt and pepper for taste. Regarding salt, the rule of thumb is that if you’re *unsure* whether it’s salted enough, add salt until you’re sure. But it’s okay if it’s a bit under-salted at this stage, there’ll be more opportunities to fix it later. Cook until all the water has evaporated. Take out the chicken and keep it aside to cool.

Step 3: Mince ~2 medium-sized onions and ~5-7 garlic cloves. Use freshly peeled garlic instead of store-bought peeled garlic if you can because the fresher it is, the better. Garlic looses its potency slowly as its exposed to the air. In a hot pan, pour some oil and once it’s hot enough, drop the garlic. I use sunflower oil, but coconut oil also works. I haven’t tried other oils so I don’t know if it matters too much.

Step 4: Before the garlic gets burnt, transfer the onions as well. If you have shallots, use them instead of onions, either partially or fully. It’s my opinion that shallots just taste better generally compared to onions, the downside being mainly that it’s more painful to peel. Wait until the onions are browned but not until it’s really mushy (It’s gonna be a little mushy because you have minced it instead of slicing it). I prefer minced so that the onions dissolve into the mixture.

Step 5: For spices, add your traditional Indian mix: chilli powder, coriander powder, turmeric powder, oh and don’t forget garam masala. Follow your intuitions to determine the quantity of these spices, I can’t tell you how many tea-spoons or table-spoons to use because I don’t use them myself. If you’re unsure, don’t spice it too much now; you may add what’s missing as you go. Admittedly, this does require some experience with cooking. If you want a different flavour profile, you can instead only put some green chilies along with garam masala. Optionally, add minced coriander as well. The herb adds a bit of zing.

Step 6: Let’s come back to the chicken now, which must have cooled. Use a blender to shred it. You can use your hands too, but try to use a blender. Only turn on the blender for a few seconds, you don’t want to lose the texture of chicken, you just want it broken down. Remember the chicken inside the cross-section of great cutlets, that’s what you’re aiming for here.

Step 7: Add the chicken to the sautéed onion + garlic mix on the hot pan, stir it for some time, and then add your potatoes. Mix everything well. At this point you can taste it and if it’s under-seasoned in ways, you can make up for it now. If you heat too much, the potato might get too mushy so be careful with that. If you’re impatient and/or hungry you can directly eat it like this, and it should taste pretty good. But it’s not as fun, so let’s add some crisps.

Step 8: Now we’re going to the last step, which is deep-frying. Keep the mix aside and let it cool. Once it’s cooled, take three plates and place them side by side. Pour bread crumbs into the middle one. Keep the cutlet mix in the right-most one, and you’ll use the left-most one to keep the breaded ready-to-fry pieces. Have one bowl out too, with two beaten eggs inside. Don’t forget to season it. You can season the bread crumbs too if you want.

Step 9: Take your cutlet mix and use your hands to create a teardrop shape or a disk shape. Don’t make it too thick for you’ll need that much more oil to fry it. You should get around 5-6 cutlets out of your mix. Pick them up one by one, dunk them into egg, then throw it into the bread crumbs and cover it fully, and keep it aside in the last plate.

Step 10: Pour some significant quantity of oil (however much you can spare) into a pan. Put it on medium heat. Once it’s hot, place the cutlets into it one by one. Don’t clutter it. And make sure to not let the oil become too hot because the cutlet might break. Keep turning it around every 2-3 minutes until it’s brown (a little lighter than your traditional cutlet colour since it darkens once you take it out). If you have to do a round 2, then decrease the stove heat because your oil will be too hot by now. Take them out and keep them on a paper towel to absorb some of the extra oil.

Step 11: And there you go, some very cool cutlets! Enjoy with tomato ketchup.