Make Butter Chicken Dairy-Free With This Simply Delicious Swap

Here's the surprising thing about butter chicken that's going to bring joy to the heart of lactose-intolerant people everywhere: it's already halfway to being dairy-free before you start cooking. Just take a look at Julianne De Witt's crockpot butter chicken recipe — instead of using butter, De Witt relied on heavy cream (which has far less lactose) to get the signature velvety richness. Still too much dairy for you? Give it a splash of full-fat coconut milk instead. For the price of precisely zero grams of lactose, you'd get all the flavor and creaminess you'd expect from this dish.

Made from the flesh of mature coconuts, rich with fat and oil, coconut milk is the perfect non-dairy substitute for cooking. Its texture, being a perfect match with dairy cream, provides the perfect body to this dish. Meanwhile, the subtle sweet-nuttiness can further deepen all the spices in it — ginger, garam masala, paprika, cumin, and so on — to make them pop even more on your palate. All you have to do is whisk in one 14 ounce can for every 2 to 3 pounds of chicken your recipe calls for, and you're good to go.

Perhaps the best thing about this swap, though, is how fuss-less it is. You might expect the thick milk to curdle and refuse to soak into the basmati rice you've prepped, while not sticking  to your chicken thighs. Nope — the sauce has a nice balance between thickness and liquidity, clinging to the chicken thighs while being able to soak nicely into the rice to flavor it. Some might even find this version even tastier than the traditional one!

When you head to the canned food aisle to find coconut milk, you'll likely spot coconut cream right alongside it. You might consider using it as a substitute in your butter chicken instead. But, while they do come from the same source, the two offer a completely different taste and texture that'll send the dish in wildly different directions.

The main draw of coconut milk is that it's pourable. If you like your sauce to be able to flow freely and coat chicken nicely, while also seeping into the rice or naan bread, it's the one for you. Coconut cream, on the other hand, has a much more pronounced coconut flavor. Thick like sour cream, it will crank everything up to the nines – clinging to the chicken with almost aggressive intensity, creating an ultra-luxurious sauce that some may find it a bit too strong. 

You'll also find full-fat and light coconut milk options in stores. Full-fat versions deliver that rich, velvety richness you're after in butter chicken, while light coconut milk uses less coconut solids and more liquid — resulting in a thinner sauce that's still flavorful but a bit less indulgent. Per our taste-tester's ranking of coconut milk brands, Sprouts and Coco López provide a balance of coconut flavor and creaminess to pick up the dish's flavor without washing it out.