Biryani

Arts & Culture Culture, Arts, Literature & Linguistics
1

Yesterday I looked up the number of a so called Indian-cum-Pakistani-cum-Bangali restuarant and ordered a carry out for Biryani and Riata. Since I am still new in the area, I had trouble finding the place, but does that matter considering Biryani? a big NO.

Anyway, I got there, picked up the Biryani with anxious heart and came back home. I opened the container and started eating. In my humble opinion, the stuff that I ate was simply a mix of masala chicken with nuts and cooked rice. I was extremely disappointed.

Isn’t it that at least in its simplest form, Biryani is supposed to have different layers and color of enriched, spiced rice with meat? When I pay freakin’ 14 bucks for something, I don’t want to eat an after-mix of chicken salan and rice, I can do that myself at home.

What’s up with these so called Indian/Pakistani restuarants anyway? I can live with their way of making curry and then adding meat/vegetables to it given the fact that it’s not like back home anyway but dishes like Biryani or Haleem??? I feel cheated. Just because gora quam is not familiar how the actual food looks and tastes like does not mean that you don’t make efforts to make something that could at least resemble something close to a traditional dish.

Sometimes I wonder why is it that so many people come from India/Pakistan who never had cooked in their lives and start making big money by opening these restuarants here and those real ‘artists’ back home just stay there and never get proper representation in the immigrant cook community here?

I know so many such great people back in Lahore who have these thara places or rahris that they sell their stuff on and their food is just excellent. You can’t have enough of it. Why can’t some of them make it to America? We definitely need proper representaion of such thara place cook population here in US!

2

Roman honestly speaking biryani is not that hard to cook you can give it a try yourself at home :)
I can even post up a simple recipe ;)

--<--@ In Life there are no problems, only solutions waiting to be found @-->--

3

Ouch…you could have asked them about their ’level’ before ordering, most Pakistani and Indians would tell you about there food quality. And Yep most desis cook for goras and since they are their main customers, our desis ’adjust’ our food to their taste. They should be punished for ruining our cuisine, but then again they’re introducing our food to goras, and when non-desis will learn to eat spicy food, hopefully desi cooks will change their style too. :)

Anchal…you’re a good cook na…khud kaha tha :)then how about starting a desi recipe mugablah?

4

muqabla

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yaar sabah kia pata baray main meray haat ka chaar saal say khaa rahay hain …
ho sakta hay used to ho kay ab yahee acha lagta ho to tareefoon kay pul bandhtay pirthay hain

http://www.pak.org/gupshup/biggrin.gif

btw main versatile cook hoon
i dont go for to the book recipes
i cant i simply have to give it my personal touch

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–<–@ In Life there are no problems, only solutions waiting to be found @–>–

5

Anybody ever had Haiderabadi biryani? Thats the only kind of biryani i have ever had and will ever have. The other dish that most people/ restaurants call biryani is a simple mix of white rice and chicken curry, with some haldi to deceive people. If anyone needs a recipe, this is one thing that im good at :)

6

Akif,

I would love to have the receipe for Hydrabadi Biryani, thanks for the offer.

[This message has been edited by Rani (edited February 01, 2000).]

7

Alright guys, Biryani recipes it is now! Give out your secrets, we want in!!

8

ohooooo lagta hay main gupshup ki bawarchi lagi howi hoon

http://www.pak.org/gupshup/mad.gif

acha kher biryanis vary from simplest to complex …
my theory is the simple you keep it the better

so here is chicken biryani

For half a kilo of chicken (i have my chicken cut into stir fry strips from the butcher cause it takes less time to cook)

  1. ghee garam karain us main ek bari pyaaz brown karain
  2. jab pyaaz laal ho jain to us main sabat garam misala, kaala zeeera (some use safeed zeera but i prefer kaala for biryanis) daal kay deegchi ka dhakan laga dain takay khushboo achay say ho jai
  3. chicken ko ab add karain along with pissa howi lehsan aur khob bhonain until kay chicken kay pieces white ho jain
  4. ab is main namak, laal mirch, aur haldi dalain along with adrak pisi howi
  5. do timatar panch dhania ki dandain aur char hari mirchain daal kar thora sa bhoonain
  6. cover kar kay stove ko halqa kar dain aur paknay dain fifteen minutes kay lya
  7. four cups of rice ko dho kar microwave safe bowl main along with namak and three cups of water fifteen minutes kay lya microwave main cook kar lain (if you have a rice cooker even better )
  8. chawal ko ab chicken kay ooper bicha dain and add a bit of food color aur fifteen min tak dam karain
  9. garam garam biryani tayyar …

raita aur salad kay saath nosh farmain :slight_smile:

–<–@ In Life there are no problems, only solutions waiting to be found @–>–

9

Anchal...thats the common pakistani version of biryani, which is something that can also be achieved by mixing white rice with chicken curry. Biryani originated from hyderabad, and hence is called haiderabadi biryani, also known as "kachey gosht ki biryani". The taste is out of this world.

Rani..here goes.
First the masala. It includes a host of things, which my mom told me, but i might have forgotten most of them. However, the main ones are salt, whole black pepper, red chilli, bari illaichi, cinnamon sticks, clove, black zeera, and other masalas that u might wanna add according to ur taste.
Grind these up a little, and blend them in yogurt. Take the chicken, and mix it in the yogurt, and let it marinate for at least 10-12 hours. My mom would set it the night before she was to cook it...so if u wanna cook it tomorrow night, start marination tonite. Put oil in a big degchi, fry onions in it to a crisp, take out the onions, and put the marinated chicken (alongwith all the yogurt) in the same oil. Let the oil boil up around the chicken. Semi boil rice in a seperate degchi, and place the semi-boiled rice over the chicken. Now remember the chicken is still raw, so it will need some time to cook. This is what my mom does. She sets the lid on the degchi, and seals the corner with dough. The dough sets in a few seconds, and totally seals the degchi. Now lower the flame to its lowest, and let it sit....for a lonnnnng time. around one hour or so...depending on how much chicken and rice u have in there. Give it as much time as you can, because once u open it, there wont be a chance to close it back up, because all the steam will be gone. While its cooking, take some saffron, and put it in a couple of teaspoons of water. Once the biryani is cooked, pour that saffron mix onto the biryani, alongwith the fried onions to give it an immaculate color and aroma.
A common misconception people get from this recipe is that the chicken is totally raw, and the rice are half boiled, therefore, after a long simmer, the rice will be halwa and the chicken will be barely cooked. But its quite the opposite. The chicken cooks first...the rice cook later. I dont know what goes on inside the degchi, but i asked my mom the same, and she said it was the opposite...as i saw it myself. So dont hesitate to cook it for a conveniently long time. Try it will small amounts of ingrediencts, in order to get an idea of how much time to give it. :)

[This message has been edited by Akif (edited February 02, 2000).]

10

Murgh biryani

1 Chicken
2 large onion
Ginger/garlic
2 glasses of rice
1 cup yogurt
3 tomato
Green chili
One handful mint
Imli
Oil/ghee

1 tp zeera
1 tp dhania
1 tp kaali mirch
2 tp laal mirch
1½ ts salt
a little dar cheeni, Laung, ilaichi

Method:

Cut onion into thin long pieces and fry them till Braun, take ’em out and keep aside

Cut chicken into pieces and fry it in another pan, with ginger and garlic.
When it starts changing color (white) ad namak mich, zeera, dhania, tomato and stir for 5 min.
Ad the other masalas, mint and yogurt and stir it for 5-10 min
Ad the onion and fry for some minutes again

Boil 3½ glasses of water in a vessel, with salt – let the water boil and when hot ad the rice, let em cook till almost done. Then remove and ‘wash’ ‘em with cold water.

Take a ’bigger’ degchi, and put a tp of oil on the bottom,
Ad first layer of rice, and on top of that one layer salan, continues till you don’t have any more rice. The last layer should be of rice.
Then put some green chili on top, some food color (orange) and imli.
Put it on dam, if in own, then heat it before you put you biryani in, and then let it on dum for 20 min. If you don’t have an own hmmmm put a wet thick kapra around the ’dhakan’ the put the dhakan on deghchi and on top of then put something heavy – dum for 15-20 min.

Avoid as much ghee/oil as you can when you are preparing biryani for dum
Eat it with fingers :)

11

Akif, Sabah and Anchal thanks for the recipe.

While reading all those wonderful recipes I can already smell and taste the Biryani. Thanks again, for divulging your favorite recipe. I will let you know how it turned out.

12

Ok, ok… this is a little confusing, so many recipes, so much confusion. I got a better idea. Why don’t you guys cook it and send it to me? I will decide which one better and stick to it.

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Thanks a bunch guys for recipes!

13

bawarchi to bawarchi ab waiter ka kaam bhi karna paray ga

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acha Roman just emailed you a garam garam plate of biryani

Akif since Roman is a novice in cooking so i thought posting a simple recipe which has ingredients that Roman will definitely find in his fridge and cupboards will help :slight_smile:

there is another kinda biryani thats called Sindhi Biryani
i can post the recipe for that too :slight_smile:

oye Saba itni degchian gandi karlin sirf biryani bananay kay lya

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ab dhoay ga kaun

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lets put Roman to the task of washing all the dishes and pans

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–<–@ In Life there are no problems, only solutions waiting to be found @–>–

14

Akif if i had chicken in my freezer now i would have given it a try

http://www.pak.org/gupshup/frown.gif

i will surely try it over the weekend and let you know :slight_smile:

btw thanks for the recipe :slight_smile:

–<–@ In Life there are no problems, only solutions waiting to be found @–>–

15

Anchal....sindhi biryani??? lets hear it :)
Cant let a good recipe go to waste.

16

accha sindhi biryani ki bhi recipe likh lain

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the trick in this one is that all the vegies except pyaz are steamed over the meat …

so fry bari pyaz till brown phir us main gosht along with all the khara masala zeera lehsan adrak and the namak mirch haldi dhania zeera and garam masla pissa howa …
phir alloo add karain aur bhonain jab gosht gal jai almost to timatar dhania poodeena and hari mirchain gosht kay oopera bicha dain dont mix dhankan laga kar chola ahista kar lain
fifteen min kay baad is main ooper say chawal add kar kay aur dam karain

honeslty writing recipes is more difficult then cooking them

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–<–@ In Life there are no problems, only solutions waiting to be found @–>–

17

Rani,

I am finally at the stage where I'm mentally prepared to undergo biryani-cooking. Among all the above recipes, I have decided to kinda mix them up and come up with one (I still have to figure out how would that be possible though) recipe, but I meant to ask you, did you try cooking it? Which method did you use and how did it come out?

18

Roman,

I mixed up a few recipes and came up with something similar to what you are trying to do. Basically I marinated the chicken overnight in yogurt and spices, crushed garlic and ginger . I browned onions then, I browned the chicken (I don't like raw chicken in my rice ) and added the marinade to the chicken and let it cook for a few minutes. I Parboiled the rice added saffron (soaked in small amount of water) arranged a alternating layer of chicken mixture and rice in a casserole dish and baked it (tightly covered) for 45min to an hour at 375F.

Hmmm......it was delicious.

19

roman y don't u start Cooking forum?

20

Roman Yara,
I’m not going to tell you again :
GET MARRIED

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