I had gone into hibernating mode for a while and now trying to wake up to the world again :D... That doesn't mean I have not been trying out new dishess but just that I became a bit too lazy to put them up. Finally I feel this low calori biriyani was the right dish to make my come back ;) so to speak. I always used to feel I could never do a biriyani because it might be very complicated but now I have come to realize it is quite easy and if you can find someone to do the dishes for you after you are done nothing like this hehehehe. I hope you will enjoy making this as much as I did. All your feedbacks are welcome...... Now enjoy!!
Ingredients :
1) 400 gms mutton
2-3 tblsp curds
2 tblsp ginger garlic paste
1 tsp tblsp coriander pwd
1 tsp cumin pwd
¼ tsp turmeric pwd
¼ tsp cinnamon pwd (optional)
1 tsp garam masala
Half of fried onions
Salt to taste
Meat tenderizer – 1 tblsp (optional)
2) 2-3 tomatoes (medium size) – finely diced
3) coriander leaves – 1 bunch or as per taste
mint leaves – 1- 2 tblsps if putting dried mint otherwise as per taste
3-4 onions medium sized sliced thinly and fried till golden brown
saffron – a pinch soak in 4-5 tblsp of warm milk or water
4) 2 cups of biriyani rice soaked for half an hour
Bay leaf - 1
Cardamom – 3-4
Black cardamom – 1 (optional)
Star anise (optional)
Cinnamon – 1 ½ inch
Shahi jeera or black cumin – 1 tsp (optional)
Salt as per taste or about 1 tsp
Method:
Marinate the mutton with the ingredients mentioned in the first segment for about an hour. For the fried onions, slice 3-4 medium sized onions as thin as you can and fry them till golden brown. From this take half and crush them with hand while mixing them with the mutton.
Take a pressure cooker put in the marinated mutton and add half a cup of water and pressure cook for about 4-5 whistles or till you see the meat is as cooked as you want it to be. So when you open the pressure cooker and see if the meat is not cooked as per your tastes then you can close it again and give more whistles. So here depending on your pressure cooker you can increase or decrease the number of whistles.
Once the pressure is gone from the cooker and you can safely open you will notice that there will be some gravy in the mutton so put it back on fire and add finely diced tomatoes. You can remove the skin of the tomatoes if you don’t like it or don’t want it to be seen in the final product. I leave it one since I love tomatoes as whole. Now cook the mutton with lid open and stirring occasionally till all the water is gone and the tomatoes are nicely blended into the meat. That is it the meat part is done now we need to move to the rice part.
Bring the water for rice to a boil and add the bay leaf, cinnamon stick, cardamoms, star anise, shahi jeera and add salt. Now add the soaked rice to the water and cook for exactly five minutes after the rice starts boiling. Make sure you check the time because you don’t want to over cook the rice, it should be 3/4th done. Drain the rice. Now take the vessel you intend to cook biriyani in and spread a layer of rice and then spread the cooked mutton on top of the rice, spread a handful of fried onions, half of coriander leaves, the whole of mint leaves and then half of the saffron milk or water. On top of this spread the rest of the rice and then add the spread rest of the coriander leaves and then the fried onions and finally the saffron. Close the vessel with its lid and then take some aluminium foil and nicely cover the lid and around the edge of the vessel so that the steam stays inside and your biriyani cooks on dum.
Put the vessel with biriyani into your gas oven and cook on 160-165 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes. Or if you do not have gas oven then put the vessel on a flat frying pan and put it on small flame for the same amount of time and for safety put a heavy vessel or something on top of the lid so that no steam escape.
Voi - là the biriyani is now ready, you can give it a nice mix so that everyone gets everything. Serve it with any raita or just plain curds.
Now you will notice I have hardly used any oil – that is except for the fried onions, which you get ready made also. If you live in Dubai you can find the readymade fried onions in Spinneys and Shop 'n Save. I feel if you add too much of oil the biriyani becomes a lot heavy on the tummy, but be my guest you can add ghee, butter or oil while cooking the mutton and then once you finish layering the last layer or rice you can add then too. I personally felt no much of taste difference without using them. Secondly I have not added any red chilly or green because my daughter doesn’t like spicy stuff so if you like spicy you can add a mix of both while cooking the meat.
Carrot - 3 nos. - perferably sweet kind otherwise you could add a dash of sugar - cut in thin rounds (these carrots look pale and pathetic courtesy my nokia 71 but actually are a bright shade of orange. :)
Red Bell Pepper - 1 no. cut in lengths
Once the pressure is gone drain the stock and you can keep aside the bone and the meat on them. And in this stock put all the ingredients for the main body and cook till the pumpkin is cooked well (the rest would be most definitely cooked since pumpkin takes the most time). Switch off the gas and let it cool a bit
Now put the whole thing in a blender if you have the big blender otherwise do two to three times and blend the whole thing into a smooth paste, like you can see in the picture. Pour it back to the soup pot and adjust the seasoning if the need be. You can add pepper to this at this time either crushed or pwd as you please.
Finally when you are ready to eat you can reheat and serve garnished with croutons and basil or without the choice is yours