Ingredients:
whole chicken 1 Kg
Basmati rice 1Kg
Onion 1 no ? thinly sliced
Ginger paste from 1inch
Garlic paste from 6 flakes
Chilli powder ? 3 tsp
Turmeric powder ? ? tsp
Cashew nuts ? 12 nos
Bay leaves ? 3 nos
Cloves ? 2 nos
Cinnamon bark ? 1 inch
Cardamom ? 3 nos
Cumin Seeds?? 2 tsp
Mint leaves ? 1 cup
Coriander leaves ? ? cup
Garam masala powder ? ? tsp
Lime – 1 no
Salt ? 1 ? tsp or to taste
Ghee ? 3 tbsp
Curd ? ? cup
Oil ? 3 tbsp
Saffron -1 tsp
Onion ? 2 nos finely chopped
Method:
Make incisions on the chicken ? and marinate for an hour with a mixture of turmeric, chilli powder, salt, garlic paste, curd and half-lime’s juice.
Heat the oil in apan and add cumin, cloves, cinnamon, depoded cardamom and bay leaves.
When the spices start to splutter add the onion and when they turn transparent add the coriander powder.
Then?add mint leaves,?marinated chicken and cook for about 20 min.
It should NOT be fully cooked at this stage; add garam masala and coconut powder and turn off flame when about ? cooked.
Gravy should not be much, chicken pieces should look roasted.
Meanwhile,?prepare the biryani rice. Slightly rinse 3 cups of basmati, and add water little less than the volume of the rice itself so that its only half cooked preferably in an electric cooker. Amount of water actually depends on kind of rice at hand and your experience helps to judge it. Also add 1-2 teaspoons of salt to it. Take a few semi-cooked grains of rice and colour them with diluted saffron for garnishing.
Place about half of semi-cooked rice in it. Next, layer half of chicken on it again topped by a layer of rice (half of the remaining). One more layer of remaining chicken, finally with layer of rest of the rice on top ends the rice-chicken layering stage.
Heat oil and deep fry half the sliced onions to golden brown. Similarly fry cashew.
Garnish the top layer with these two along with 100 ml ghee, coconut milk, saffron rice grains and coriander. Lid the vessel and try making it airtight (but no pressure should build up).
Put on high flame for 5 min before reducing it to low flame. The flame should NOT be at the vessel’s centre, but on one side of it. Wait for 2-3 min and turn the vessel to heat other next part on its circumference.
This way, keep rotating the vessel every 2-3 min for about 20 min. Every time you turn it, carefully disturb the contents by a shake/jerk so as to avoid settling of ghee at the bottom.
Put off the flame and wait for about 10 min before opening.
Before serving, mix?from the bottom.
