Chicken Biryani 2

There are various ways of preparing a biryani. Each time I try a new biryani in my family/ friends place/ restaurants, I get intrigued by their new flavour and taste and I only get tempted to replicate in my kitchen. I just can't get enough of a single biryani recipe. 

This time I tried a new way of making my biryani with almost the usual ingredients but with a slight twist (Another of my chicken biryani recipe is here). Believe me, the end result of this biryani was totally incredible. The roasting and slow cooking of chicken did the trick. Chicken was perfectly cooked - slightly crisp on the outside, soft, tender and succulent on the inside with the juices of the biryani oozing out in each bite of the chicken; the rice was soft and fluffy and the flavour of the biryani was just the right way I wanted. In a nutshell, it turned out to be the best biryani I've ever had. 

Ingredients

1 cup basmati rice

1 medium sized onion (very thinly sliced)

1 big tomato (very finely chopped)

5 ts thick curd

5 green chillies (slit opened)

1 inch ginger piece (finely grated)

3 garlic cloves (finely grated)

1/4 ts turmeric powder, 1/2 ts chilli powder, 1 ts coriander powder

2 bay leaves

Handful of mint leaves (finely chopped)

2 tbs oil + 1 tbs  ghee

For marination

3 chicken drumsticks

2 ts thick curd

3/4  ts chicken masala

1/2 ts chilli powder

1/4 ts ginger garlic paste

For the biryani masala

1 ts peppercorns

1 ts cumin seed

3/4 ts fennel seed

1 ts kasa kasa

3 cloves

2 green cardamom

1 black cardamom

1 mace

Preparation

Chicken marination

Clean and wash the chicken pieces in running water. Make slits in the chicken pieces everywhere for the marinade to seep through. Combine them with ginger garlic paste, yoghurt, salt, chicken masala and chilli powder just enough to coat the chicken pieces. Marinate them for a minimum of half an hour or preferably more time. The longer you marinate the chicken pieces, the better tasting it turns out to be.

Biryani masala

Heat a wide, thick flat bottomed pan. Add all the whole masala mentioned in the list above and dry roast in medium flame until they give out a good aroma. Take them out in a separate plate. After they've cooled down, grind them to a very fine powder. (You can also skip the dry roasting and directly powder them, but roasting does give its magic.)

Rice

Wash and soak rice in water before you start the biryani preparation. 

Biryani

- Heat oil and ghee in a big stock pot. (Big non-stick stock pot is preferable as you need to cook the chicken for a longer time) Add the thinly sliced onions and fry them until they turn slight golden.

- Add the marinated chicken pieces and fry them along with onions in high flame until the chicken pieces turn brownish on all sides and gets roasted. This may take about 5 - 10 minutes.

- Turn the flame to a medium. Now add the ginger, garlic, green chillies, mint leaves, turmeric powder, chilli powder, coriander powder, biryani masala and enough salt. Give a good toss to the chicken pieces so that they get well coated with the masala. 

- Whisk the yoghurt so that they are free of lumps. Add them to the chicken and masala mixture.

- Also add in the finely chopped tomatoes. 

- Allow the contents to boil. Then cover the pot and let in sit in low flame for around 30 minutes until the chicken turns soft and tender. 

- As the chicken and tomatoes gets cooked, they leave out their own water and the mixture will initially turn out to form a good gravy. You have to allow them to cook further until the gravy is devoid of moisture, turns out thick and oil separates from them.  

- Now is the time to add the rice. Also add salt and 1 3/4 cups water. Mix them gently without breaking the grains of the rice. 

- Allow the rice to boil. Then cover the pot, keep the flame in simmer and cook until the rice turns out soft and fluffy.

Enjoy them with onion raita, boiled egg, salna/ any chicken masala preparation.