Butter Chicken (Shrimp Substitute) with Rice
I have always been a fan of Butter Chicken. Always. And at my 9-5 job we use to have potlucks almost every week. A couple girls that I worked with would always bring Butter Chicken (and Samosas … YUM!) for the potlucks and because of my love for both, they would always bring extra for me. Now I don’t get to work with those lovely ladies anymore which means I don’t get to enjoy that delicious butter chicken anymore! I have had to get creative over the years and make my own. I have made my own butter chicken sauce from scratch but sometimes I get lazy and use the pre-packaged stuff instead. We used shrimp this time because we seem to have chicken with almost every dinner recipe and wanted to switch it up. So battered shrimp it was! Mark also bought me an air fryer for Christmas this past year (thanks babe!) so what a great time to use it!
Serving Size: 3
Ingredients
20-40 medium sized Shrimp, peeled
1 Cup Flour
1-2 Cups Panko Bread Crumbs
2-3 Eggs
2 Packages VH Butter Chicken Sauce
1/4 Cup Heavy Cream (as called out on the Butter Chicken Sauce packaging)
1 Cup Rice (We use Basmati but any rice of choice will work)
2 Pieces of Naan Bread
2 Tbsp. Vegetable Oil (if using Air Fryer, would need more if pan frying)
Fresh Parsley for garnish
Directions
First thing you want to do is get the rice started. Hopefully you know how to cook rice (otherwise you should be looking for that recipe first, JK). Here is a real quick low down - in a medium sized pot combine the 1 cup of rice with 1 cup of water and a little salt. Cook on high heat until boiling, allow to boil 1-2 minutes, turn heat down to simmer, cover and cook until rice is soft.
While the rice is cooking, prep the shrimp. In 3 separate bowls lay out the flour, eggs & panko crumbs. Whisk the eggs prior to using. Take the shrimp a couple at a time, put into the flour bowl, ensure they are fully covered, then drop them into the egg wash bowl and do the same, then finally coat them in panko and set aside. Complete for all shrimp.
Depending on how much shrimp you went with you can divide them into 2 groups and fry to ensure even coverage. If using an air fryer it is about 7-10 minutes per 16-20 shrimp. I always stop the timer a couple times and shake up the shrimp.
While the shrimp is cooking, add the Butter Chicken sauce and the heavy cream into a wok and simmer on low heat. Once the rice is fully cooked and all shrimp are cooked you can add the shrimp to the butter chicken sauce briefly and mix it up. You don’t want to let the shrimp sit in the butter chicken sauce for too long or all the cripsy-ness you just got from frying up the shrimp will go away.
Add rice to a bowl then top with the Shrimp and a little fresh parsley for garnish. Serve with Naan Bread! Mmmm Mmmm Delicious!
