🇮🇳 India · Family: Kathi Roll · Region: Kolkata · Heat: Mixed · Bread: paratha · Proteins: chicken
Ingredients
The Kolkata Chicken Roll is the Kolkata street roll built around spiced chicken: a paratha wrapped around chicken pieces with onion and chutney. The angle is a clean, savory protein wrap where the flaky griddled flatbread does the structural work and the seasonings keep it from being one-note. Everything its source names is essential, the chicken, the raw onion, the chutney, and the paratha itself, and none of it is decoration. It is a handheld, eaten-walking format with no plate and no cutlery.
The build is sequential. Chicken is cut into pieces, seasoned with chili, ginger, garlic, and warm spices, and cooked on a hot griddle or grill until it takes color at the edges while staying moist. The paratha, a flaky maida flatbread, is fried on a tawa until it blisters and crisps in patches and is supple enough to roll without cracking. The hot flatbread is laid flat, the spiced chicken is arranged in a line down the center, thinly sliced raw onion is scattered over, and a streak of chutney is run along the length, often with a squeeze of lime. The bread is rolled tight into a cylinder and half-wrapped in paper for the hand. Good execution keeps the chicken juicy with a little char, the paratha crisp on the outside and structurally sound, and the onion and chutney sharp enough to cut the richness on every bite. Sloppy versions overcook the chicken to dry shreds, use an underdone slack paratha that turns to a wet seam, or skimp the onion and chutney so the roll reads flat and greasy.
Variations move through marinade and wrapper. Some stalls run a tandoori-style chicken with a deeper, smokier char; others keep a lighter spice. The paratha can be plain or egg-coated on one face for extra richness and grip. Chutney choice swings the profile, mint-coriander pushing fresh, a chili-garlic sauce pushing hot. The egg roll and the fish roll come from the same stall and the same wrapper logic but are distinct members of the family, and each deserves its own article rather than being crowded in here. What stays constant is the source's specification: a paratha around spiced chicken with onion and chutney.
More from this family
Other Kathi Roll sandwiches in India:
