Soya Chaap Butter Masala is a vegetarian butter chicken – a truly restaurant style soya chaap makhani recipe.
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The Signature Butter Masala Gravy
The process of making soya chaap butter masala might look long but is the simplest one. It is a three steps process. First step, is to marinate and grill the soya chaap tikka. The second step is to make the butter masala gravy. The third step is to combine both and do the finishing touch.
For this butter masala recipe, you can use my pre-made, signature makhani masala or the no onion, no garlic Jain style butter masala gravy.
My cookbook has a vegan soya chaap tikka masala recipe that you can easily cook in an instant pot.
What is Soya Chaap?
Soya Chaap is mock meat or vegan meat made with soya beans. The soya meat is wrapped around wooden sticks to give a vegetarian leg-piece-like appearance. Hence, the name soya chaap.
Soya Chaap is readily available in the dairy section of supermarkets, grocery stores, and frozen or canned food sections.
It has a perfect meaty texture to compliment the rich and creamy Indian vegetarian curries such as Punjabi Soya Chaap Masala.
Ingredients Required For Gravy
- Soya Chaap: I use fresh or canned soya sticks for this curry recipe.
- Curry Base: Onion, Tomato, Garlic, Ginger
- Creaminess: Cashew, White Poppy Seeds, Fresh Cream
- Tomato Ketchup: It gives a delectable sweet taste to the butter masala gravy. You can use tomato sauce or tomato paste instead of ketchup.
- Spices: Kashmiri Red Chilies, Red Chili Powder, Salt, Kasuri Methi, and Garam Masala
- Cooking Oil: You can use butter, ghee, or refined oil for cooking the masala.
- Other Ingredients: Salt, Water
How To Make Soya Chaap Makhani
This Soya Chaap Butter Masala Recipe is a two-step process.
- Marinate and Fry the Soya Meat
- Prepare the Gravy
- Assemble the Curry
Marinate and Fry the Soya Meat
- Remove wooden sticks from the soya meat and cut the chaap into bite-size round or oval pieces.
- Marinate chaap with salt, ginger-garlic paste, curd, red chili powder, and turmeric powder. Mix to coat each piece with the marinade masala (images 1 & 2). Keep aside for 30 minutes to 1 hour. You can marinate them overnight as well.
- Heat oil in a pan for shallow frying. Once the oil is hot, fry the soya chaap till crisp and golden from both sides (image 3). You can air-fry them as well. Transfer fried soya chunks to a bowl and set aside.
Prepare the Gravy
- Heat oil in a heavy bottom kadhai or wok over medium flame. Add dried red chili, poppy seeds, onion, ginger, garlic, and cashews. Fry the masala till the onion turn light brown (image 1).
- Add chopped tomato and season with salt. Cook the tomatoes until they are mushy and the oil separates from the masala.
- Once tomato masala is ready, add water and stir to mix. Simmer for 1 minute. Turn off the heat. Transfer the tomato masala to a blender. Grind to a smooth paste (images 2 & 3).
- Transfer the butter masala gravy to the pan after blending. For a silky smooth texture, pass it through a sieve (image 4).
Final Simmer and Season
- Turn on the heat. Once the gravy starts simmering, add red chilli powder, tomato ketchup, garam masala, fresh cream, and kasuri methi. Stir to combine. Allow the butter masala gravy to simmer for 5 minutes over low heat. Taste and adjust the seasoning according to preference.
- Add the fried soya chaap meat to the butter masala gravy. Combine. Cover the pan with a lid, and simmer the curry over low heat for another 5 minutes.
- Garnish soya chaap butter masala with fresh cream and fresh coriander.
Serving Suggestion
This is a truly restaurant-style curry that tastes perfect with whole wheat naan, paratha, roomali roti, lachha paratha, or jeera rice.
Store the leftover soya chaap butter masala in the refrigerator for 2 – 3 days. While reheating, add ¼ cup of milk to get a curry-like creamy consistency.
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Soya Chaap Butter Masala Recipe
- Heavy Bottom Kadhai
Ingredients
Ingredients for marinade
- 4 soya chaap sticks
- 2 tablespoon curd
- 1 teaspoon ginger and garlic paste (see recipe)
- 1 teaspoon red chili powder
- 1 teaspoon salt or to taste
- ¼ teaspoon turmeric powder
- 1 teaspoon coriander powder
Ingredients for Butter Masala Gravy
- ¼ Cup refined oil
- ¼ Cup cashews (kaju)
- 1 tablespoon white poppy seeds (khus-khus)
- ½ Cup chopped onion
- 1 tablespoon chopped ginger
- 1 tablespoon chopped garlic
- 1 Cup chopped tomato
- 1 ¼ teaspoon salt or to taste
- 1 teaspoon red chili powder
- 2 tablespoon tomato ketchup
- 1 ¼ Cup water
- ¼ Cup fresh cream
- ½ teaspoon Garam Masala (see recipe)
- 1 tablespoon dried fenugreek leaves (kasuri methi)
- 2 tablespoon chopped fresh coriander leaves
Instructions
Soya Chaap Tikka
- To make soya chaap tikka masala first marinade the soya chaap.
- Gently remove soya chaap from the sticks. You can easily slide them using a fork. Cut the chaap into bite-size round or oval pieces.
- Combine soya chaap and the remaining marinade ingredients in a bowl. Combine to coat each piece with the marinade. Keep in the refrigerator overnight or for 30 minutes atleast.
- Heat 4 tablespoons of oil in a pan for shallow frying. Once the oil is hot, fry the soya chaap till crisp and golden from both sides. Transfer fried soya chunks to a bowl and set aside. You can grill them on a BBQ, tandoor, oven, or air fryer.
Butter Masala Gravy
- To prepare the butter masala gravy, heat the remaining oil in a heavy bottom kadhai or wok over medium flame. Add dried red chili, poppy seeds, onion, ginger, garlic, and cashews. Fry the masala till the onion turn light brown.
- Add chopped tomato and season with salt. Cook the tomatoes until they are mushy and the oil separates from the masala.
- Once tomato masala is ready, add ¼ cup of water and stir to mix. Simmer for 1 minute. Turn off the heat. Transfer the tomato masala to a blender. Grind to a smooth paste.
Final Touch
- Transfer the butter masala gravy to the pan after blending. For a silky smooth texture, pass it through a sieve.
- Turn on the heat. Add 1 cup of water. Stor to combine. Once the gravy starts simmering, add red chili powder, tomato ketchup, garam masala, fresh cream, and kasuri methi. Stir to combine. Allow the butter masala gravy to simmer for 5 minutes over low heat. Taste and adjust the seasoning according to preference.
- Add the fried soya chaap meat to the butter masala gravy. Combine. Cover the pan with a lid, and simmer the curry over low heat for another 5 minutes.
- Garnish soya chaap butter masala with coriander leaves and fresh cream.
- Serve Soya Chaap Butter Masala with naan or lachha paratha.
Recipe Notes:
- I use fresh or canned soya chaap for making this curry. Do not use dried or dehydrated soya meat.
- You can grill soya chaap tikka in the oven or the grill mode of the microwave.
- If there is no time to marinade the soya meat, then at least try to marinade it till the time you prepare the gravy.
- For cooking, you can use ghee, butter, or flavorless refined oil.
Mehvali says
I extremely love thisreceipie please send different type innovation of soya chaap
Hina Gujral says
Sure. Will definitely try.
Heena says
It’s yummy.
Pls send me the recipe for how to make soya chaap as l don’t get ready chaap near my house
Hina Gujral says
Sure. Will surely try to share a homemade chaap recipe.