India / Main
Chicken biryani
Rice and marinated chicken finished together under a lid: the layers cook in steam rather than by stirring.
Ingredients
- Basmati rice, soaked 30 minutes500 g
- Chicken on the bone1 kg
- Thick yoghurt250 g
- Onions, thinly sliced3
- Ginger30 g
- Garlic6 cloves
- Garam masala2 tsp
- Chilli powder1 tsp
- Turmeric1/2 tsp
- Cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, bay1 tbsp
- Saffron1 pinch
- Warm milk60 ml
- Mint and coriander1 sprig
- Ghee or butter60 g
- Saltto taste
Quantities are auto-calculated from the original recipe as a guide. Items without numbers (e.g. “to taste”) are not changed.
Method 6 steps
Fry the onions in ghee to a deep gold — twenty minutes over medium heat. Set half aside: that is the birista, and the main flavour of the dish.
Marinate the chicken in the yoghurt with the ginger, garlic, spices, half the fried onion, mint and salt. Give it an hour, better three.
Boil the rice in plenty of salted water with the whole spices for exactly five minutes and drain. A grain should snap but stay white in the middle.
Spread the marinated chicken over the bottom of a heavy pot and the rice over it in an even layer. Pour the saffron milk over in patches and scatter the rest of the onion and the herbs.
Cover as tightly as you can, sealing the rim with foil if you like. Five minutes on a high flame, then forty on the lowest. Do not lift the lid once.
Let it stand for ten minutes, then fold once from the bottom up, lifting the chicken into the rice rather than stirring everything to a mush.
