Huro Gudiye
A side of mashed chicken with fresh herbs
- Cooking time30 mins
Calories342kcal
Raina Talukder is back on Pasher Barir Ranna with a super-simple, comforting, and protein-packed recipe from the Chakma cuisine, called "huro gudiye".
In the Chakma language "huro" means "chicken" and "gudiye" is "mash". Raina describes this dish as kind-of-a-bhorta, but not really as smooth or finely pounded as a bhorta or a baata.
The key to this dish is to fully utilise the entire range of flavours and textures chicken has to offer. In this recipe, Raina calls for using chicken with skin, with a good mix of meat, bones and cartilage. The meat forms the body, the skin adds flavour and enhances mouthfeel, and the cartilage adds crunch and texture.
The Chittagong hilltracts are considered the home of the Chakma community. Raina, whose grandfather was the first Chakma person to settle in Kolkata, describes her family's cooking as deeply connected to their origins, but having imbibed local influences from living for generations in Kolkata.
This dish, huro gudiye, is best eaten warm, for lunch, with steaming hot rice. In the video, Raina also serves alongside it another Chakma speciality, "hurbo", which is a cold salad marianted with chilli paste and fermented fish.
Do try this delightfully fresh and easy recipe, which, from start to finish, takes only 30 minutes to make, TOPS!
Frequently Asked Questions
Ingredients
- 500 g chicken (with skin on, and a good mix of meat, softer bones and cartilage; 5-cm peices)
- 65 g onions (sliced)
- 40 g ginger (roughly chopped)
- 20 g garlic (roughly chopped)
- 45 g coriander leaves (roughly chopped)
- 20 g green chillies (split)
- 6 g salt
- 1 tsp turmeric
- 25 g mustard oil
- 250 ml water
- fresh parsley for ganish
Method
- In a boiling pot, add the chicken, onion, ginger, garlic, green chillies, salt, turmeric and mustard oil.
- Mix everything together (off the heat), and allow it to marinate for 15–20 mins.
- Add water to the pot, set it on the heat, and gently poach the chicken for about 12–15 mins.
- Once the chicken is cooked through, uncover the pot, and check how much of the liquid is still in the pot.
- If there is an excess of the liquid, increase the heat, and allow it to evaporate, leaving behind about only a cup's worth of the juice.
- Allow the chciken to cool slightly.
- Now, in batches, start pounding the chicken pieces in a mortar–pestle.
- Pound the harder bones to extract their juices and discard them. Grind down and incorporate the meat and the softer bones/cartilage into the mash.
- Once the mash is roughly pounded (it will not be completely smooth like a bata), and has come together, incorporate some of the chicken juice we had saved earlier. Adjust salt if needed.
- Finish with freshly chopped parsley, and serve with hot steaming rice, and another cold Chakma side/salad, hurbo.
