ELW, I have this morning done some research on Butter in Butter Chicken. I have looked at around 20 recipes, studied the difference between Murgh Makhani and Chicken Tikka Masala and also actual Indian people's descriptions of the dish. It is completely possible to have Butter Chicken with very little or no butter. One food scientist with 50 years experience actually said that the Makhani word in this dish name is used in the context of the mouth feel of the dish being buttery in texture only and has nothing to do with the use of actual butter. He actually says that a dish containing lots of butter would be unpleasant in it's oiliness.  Mind you others say that is must contain lots of butter.

The common thing is that most contain, cream, yogurt and either ghee or butter and sometimes oil.  I guess like most Indian dishes, there are so many different interpretations that you can call it what ever you wish.  There is a recently posted thread about the 2 Indian sisters cooking this dish on BBC TV and there are some who believe that the dish is CTM. The Indian girls simply say that CTM is just UK Butter Chicken.

The discussion or debate about the difference or similarity within and between each dish will never be resolved one way or the other.  I guess only a person from the UK can say what is actually a proper CTM.

What Masala Mark told you here is completely possible. It is different to the recipe he posted under the thread of the dish name but from memory he was under the guidance of 2 different chefs. One was in lessons and the other he worked for.  This may well explain the difference we see here.

Yesterday morning, I pulled out my notes from the time I used his procedure initially, and I scaled everything down 1/5.  You wouldn't want to go much smaller as it would become micro-cooking, but even with these reduced amounts in 3 gravy / paste preparations you will be having enough to make about 20 - 30 individual dishes.  It is also a lot of work and will take 6 - 10 hours to produce all 3.  Maybe less if you look for similarities and develop shortcuts and do simultaneous preparations.  There are some commonalities in the procedures and ingredients.
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Yes, I recall my surprise at the little actual butter used in his Butter Chicken There is only 1 Tbsp of glee/butter in his recipe but 100 mls of cream and the Tomato gravy. From memory though it was quite a nice dish.  The method of 3 gravies used in combination and with varying ratios was quite laborious and the quantities took some scaling to achieve home use quantities. My notes from the time on printed sheets remind me that there were problems with amounts that I remember encountering, but in fairness he was providing a commercial process and he tells it as so, that they are huge quantities. My calculations estimate there is enough Gravy in his 3 recipes for about 100 curries.

These gravies are very concentrated in spice levels and flavours. Consequently, only water is added along with them in the dish preparation stages.  ie; No normal BIR style Base Gravy at all.

I gave it a try and it worked but it wasn't what I was after at the time. I may revisit the method again now that I have better understanding of curries in general.  Unfortunately, he didn't follow up with very many actual dish recipes.

Yes Phil, sorry. Spell auto correct on my tablet combined with no spectacles. Oops. Yes, I did mean leeching.  Leeching isn't a bad thing necessarily as, and for the reason, you suggest

The guest count may be robots I suppose, maybe not. I hadn't considered it.

I am just saying George, the Home Page banner says the site has thousands of like-minded members creating curry with passion. Over the last couple of months posts are from maybe a dozen to 20. Posts regarding cooking curry from maybe half. Just sayin, the activity on the board by the thousands of like-minded members is a bit sluggish and suggestive of not a lot of curry cooking passion.

Did a quick count through the forum. About 10 members on and close to 700 guests. Just sayin'.

Here is another interesting extract from The Guardian article 2002 discussing "Indian" food in India.

"'The hotels made very commercial food - things like butter chicken. Nobody ever cooks a butter chicken at home. I would say 90 per cent of Indian hotels make three sauces. A red sauce, which is a tomato sauce, a white sauce which is a cashew sauce and a brown onion sauce. And then when the order comes they add the cooked meat or whatever.' In this country, as a result, all sorts of adjustments have quietly to be made for Western restaurant eating."

The 3 sauces referred to here are exactly what Masala Mark has described in his Aussie IR method of 3 gravies.

The article then goes on to say; "Nor do Indians drink beer, let alone wine, with food. ".

This is not similar to Aussie IR in any way.