Chicken Tikka on Basmati Rice with a Tomato-Cucumber Salad

I had a sudden urge for curry yesterday, so I picked up a jar of Tikka curry paste. (An urge for curry, but no urge to make it the hard way... you know, the way thousands of people have been making it since forever. By hand.) (I was feeling lazy.) I hadn't tried Tikka curry before, but the jar claimed it was mild, and since I've had a very upset stomach for the last four or five days, I thought mild was probably a good idea.

It was delicious. I really like Patak's brand curry pastes.

I wanted to make a proper Cucumber Raita to go along with the tikka, but... I was feeling lazy. So lazy in fact that I bought a little tub of tzatziki instead. (Yes, I am mix and matching my cultures here.) The thing is, though, that tzatziki and cucumber raita have their two most basic building blocks in common -- plain yogurt and cucumber. The difference is really in the rest of the flavourings. So to make mine just a little hint more Indian, I spiced it with some chili powder and garam masala. (I should have stirred in some chili pepper too, but I was... say it with me... too lazy to chop one up.) Properly I should have had more of the tzatziki and less of my added vegetables, but I rather liked it this way, stirred in as a dressing.

The presentation of this is... not so hot. I should have put them both on the same plate, but I wanted to keep everything seperate. It tasted ridiculously good, anyway.