Chicken Biryani

Preparation time :15 minutes     

Cooking time : 25 minutes

Serves 2 

Difficulty :  Medium

I won’t forget the very first time when I made biryani in 1996. My friends told me that it’s very easy to make biryani in a pressure cooker. So I wanted to try that ‘easy’ method and I asked for all the ingredients, its measures, method, and each and everything in detail. Once, my grandma had advised that the quantity of water that needs to be added for cooking the rice (for regular ponni rice) depends on the quality of the rice – more the quality, greater the amount of water to be added. This I took as a rule of thumb and decided it applied to biryani as well. So I thought, as Jeera Samba is a high quality rice, I needed to add one more cup of water than for normal ponni rice. I added 4 cups of water for 1 cup biryani rice and we got “Biryani Pongal” that day!!. That day, I realized how horrible mashed biryani tasted. After many trials and tribulations, I finally I came out with this method which will come out very well. I can assure you that this method will not deceive you and by practice, you will definitely excel!

Ingredients:

• Basmathi rice – 1 cup
• Chicken – ¼ Kg
• Onion (Big) – 1 (chopped lengthwise)
• Tomato – 2 Nos.(Medium)(chopped)
• Green chilli – 1 No.
• Curd – 1 tbs
• Ginger, garlic, fennel & kuskus  paste – 1 tbs
• Chilli powder – 1tbs
• Chicken masala / Biryani powder – 1 tsp
• Coriander powder – ½ tsp
• Turmeric powder -1 tsp
• Coriander leaves (finely chopped) – 1tbsp
• Mint leaves (finely chopped) – 2 tbsp
• Salt to taste

To grind:

• Ginger – 2” piece
• Garlic   - 10 pods
• Fennel – 1tsp
• Kuskus            - ½ tsp
• Clove- 1 No.
• Cardamom – 1No.

For seasoning:

• Bay leaf – 1 No.
• Cinnamon – 1 inch piece
• Kal paasi – 1 piece
• Cloves – 2 No
• Cardamom  - 1 No.
• Fennel seeds – 1 tsp
• Oil -2 tbs
• Ghee – 1 tsp

Method:

Clean chicken well using turmeric with water , cut it to required size and keep it ready. Take a pressure cooker, pour the oil, wait till the oil gets heated. Add the items given under “seasoning” one by one and wait until all these splutter to get the aroma from the seasoning. Add onion and Green chilli (just break into 2 or 3) and sauté well until the onion becomes translucent. Then add the ground paste mentioned above and sauté till the raw smell of ginger garlic goes off. Add finely chopped tomato and add some salt so that the tomato will get cooked easily and sauté till the tomato gets smashed well. Then add all the masala powders and sauté till the oil oozes  out from the masala. Next, add curd and sauté well until the mixture gets glossy appearance. Then  add cleaned chicken , sauté well,  add half portion of coriander  & mint leaves. Add required salt for chicken and a cup of water, close the lid and wait for  3 whistles and 5 minutes in simmer. In the mean time, wash the basmathi rice and leave it as such after draining the water. It is sufficient if we do this part before 10 minutes of making biryani.

Now open the pressure cooker, drain the chicken pieces and measure the gravy, add water so that the gravy+water =2 cups for 1 cup of rice and keep it aside.

In a separate pressure pan, add ghee, sauté rice along with the balance coriander, mint leaves and the cooked chicken pieces for 2 minutes. Then add gravy+water (2 cups) and  needed salt. You can check for spice also at this stage and you can add if needed. Stir well and close the lid. Wait for 1 whistle, then simmer the flame for 3 minutes. Open the cooker after releasing the pressure slowly. Then follow the same procedure as we have done for Mushroom Biryani recipe.

Yummy Chicken Biryani is ready to serve with raita and chicken masala or talicha!!

Note:

1. Some people opt for directly adding rice to the chicken since chicken will get cooked easily. But, my vote is only for this method even it involves some more steps to follow. You will also realize this method worth following after tasting this biryani.