Dum Biryani just got a creative twist by me over few attempts of cooking Biryanis at home. The recipe has similar method of cooking yet different from regular Biryani recipes. I wanted to try a different flavour than usual tomato-onion gravy. This recipe uses few strong Indian spices roasted and blended with coriander leaves to give it a golden-greenish colour. The only difference is marination (masala) ingredients for chicken drumsticks, the rice are prepared in usual ways as of traditional biryani. Also, the final dish cooks very soft chicken and it doesn't get dry at all. Best combined with yogurt raita and green chutney.
Equipment
- large heavy bottom pan with a heavy lid
- airtight container for marination
Ingredients
For marination:
- 5 chicken drumsticks
- 1 cup fresh coriander leaves chopped with stem
- 1 tbsp red chilli powder
- 1 tsp turmeric powder
- 1 tbsp cumin powder
- 1 tsp green cardamom powder
- 1 cup fresh hung curd/or greek yogurt
- Juice of half a lemon
- 5-6 green chillies
- 10 cloves garlic
- 1 inch ginger chopped
- Salt to taste
Other ingredients:
- 2 cups of basmati rice
- 1/2 cup boiled chickpea (boil in salt water)
- 3 cloves
- 1 tsp coriander seeds
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 black cardamom
- 2 green cardamom
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 2 star anise
- 3 tbsp ghee
- 2 large onions thinly sliced
- 1/2 cup fresh coriander and mint leaves chopped
- Salt to taste
Instructions
Step 1: Marination
- Wash the chicken drumsticks under running water and pat dry with paper towel.
- Blend all marination ingredients (except yogurt and salt) in a grinder to make paste, add a little water if required.
- In a mixing bowl, mix the marination paste into yogurt and salt then rub over drumsticks to coat them well, use hands to do this.
- Cover airtight and refrigerate for at least 1-2 hours, marination (do this a night before, overnight works best as it allows all flavours to get inside the meat).
Step 2: Preparing Rice & Onions
- Wash basmati rice with water until you get transparent water, then soak it in water for an hour. Soaking helps basmati rice gain length.
- Take out about 1/2 cup of rice from total quantity and keep aside soaked in water.
- In a rice cooker, add remaining 1 & 1/2 cup of soaked rice, add about 2 small cups of water, 1 tsp ghee, salt, cloves, coriander seeds, bay leaves, black and green cardamom, cinnamon stick and star anise. Cover the lid and let it cook/boil. Allow nearly 10-15, when it is almost cooked.
- In a non stick pan, heat 1/2 tsp ghee and saute onions until golden brown. Sprinkle a little salt and keep aside. Alternatively, you can also deep fry onions until crispy.
Step 3: Layering and Dum
- Grease the heavy bottom pan with some ghee, then spread the separately kept soaked rice as base layer, this will prevent the drumsticks from burning and drying. This layer of rice gets cooked with the moisture of marination.
- Now put the marinated drumsticks as second layer one by one at some distance allowing spaces in between, then pour rest of the marination masala within these spaces and over the drumsticks.
- Add half of sauted/fried onion over drumsticks as third layer and top with boiled chickpeas, half of coriander and mint leaves.
- Now add the steamed rice on top without leaving any spaces.
- Add remaining half of onions, coriander and mint leaves and remaining ghee on top as final layer of garnish.
- Slide about 6-7 spoons of water through all the edges, this will add on some extra moisture for steam.
- Cover with aluminium foil and pack the pan tightly around edges ensuring no steam can get out. Then cover with heavy lid.
- Now turn on the heat at medium-high flame for exactly 10 mins, then lower the heat and simmer for about 50-60 mins.
- Turn of the heat after 50-60 mins then let it steam until ready to serve.
Notes
Do not open the lid to check status in between, it might let the necessary steam get out quickly. You will know the aroma when its all done.