Malabar Biryani

A Biryani that is dear to the people in Thalassery- a city in Kannur district… Hope everyone who celebrated Eid had a wonderful celebration with friends and family. Honestly, I cannot think of an Eid without Biryani. A plate of biryani can bring so much happiness and celebration to me and to anyone who loves biryani.

Every Eid, I try to make a different kind of biryani. This Eid, I wanted to try one of the popular biryanis in Kerala- Thalassery biryani. Unfortunately, I haven’t tasted this biryani at any restaurants nor made by anyone from Thalassery. I came across the recipe for making this biryani in youtube, it’s an authentic recipe made in a restaurant in Thalassery.

There are three stages in making any biryani- making the meat masala, cooking the rice and Dum cooking. In this biryani, fried onions are used for making the meat masala. Yet another speciality is the rice used for making this biryani, Kaima rice or Jeerakasala rice is used, it’s a short grain rice that imparts an unique flavor and aroma and is widely used in Malabar region. The fried onions gave so much flavor and taste to this biryani, I was truly blown away. This biryani will become dear to your taste buds too.

Ingredients

• For chicken masala
• 1.2 kg chicken full chicken cut to medium pieces
• 8 medium onions
• 20 green chillies moderately hot
• 15 cloves garlic
• 2 inch ginger
• 7 medium tomatoes ripe
• 1 cup mint leaves chopped
• 1 1/2 cup cilantro coriander leaves
• 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
• 2 teaspoon fennel seeds
• 3 cardamom
• 4 inch cinnamon pieces
• 1/4 nutmeg one small piece
• 4 tablespoon yogurt
• salt to taste

For rice

• 800 gram basmati rice 4 cups
• 3 bay leaves
• 2 cardamom
• 2 inch cinnamon piece
• 1 star anise
• 1 mace
• 10 black peppercorn
• 1 lime small
• salt to taste

For garnish

• 2 onions thinly sliced
• 1 cup sultana raisins
• 1 cup Cashew nuts
• salt to taste

Step by Steps

Step 1

Add one teaspoon turmeric powder, one tablespoon Kashmiri chili powder, two tablespoons yogurt, and salt to the chicken. Mix well until the chicken pieces are coated well with this marinade. Keep it aside.

Step 2

Wash and soak 4 cups of rice in water. The rice should be soaked for at least 1 hour.

Step 3

Let's prep the ingredients for biriyani masala. Thinly slice the onions.

Step 4

Heat a cup of oil in a large pan. Once the oil is hot, lower the flame, and add the sliced onions to fry. Stir occasionally. Heat a cup of oil in a large pan. Once the oil is hot, lower the flame, and add the sliced onions to fry. Stir occasionally. Give the green chilies, ginger, and garlic a quick blitz to make a coarse paste. Slow-cook the onions till they turn brown, and add the ginger-garlic-chili paste.

Step 5

Combine well, and cook for a few minutes. Now add the chopped tomatoes, and continue cooking. Cook the tomatoes until they disappear into the mix.

Step 6

Now add chopped coriander leaves and mint leaves. Mix well, and cook for 2-3 minutes.

Step 7

Now add the marinated chicken pieces, two tablespoons yogurt, and salt to the pan. Mix gently to get chicken pieces evenly coated with the onion masala in the pan.

Step 8

Close with a lid, and cook covered till the chicken is cooked to soft. Powder cinnamon, cardamom, cumin seeds, fennel seeds, and nutmeg to a coarse powder. This is our garam masala powder.

Step 9

Open the lid, add the garam masala to the cooked chicken, mix well, and cook for another 3 minutes.

Step 10

Switch off the flame. That completes the first part of our biriyani - the chicken masala. Make sure that the chicken masala is moist enough so that biriyani won't go dry when we add rice later.

For Rice

Step 1

In another pan heat 3 tablespoons oil and 3 tablespoons ghee on a medium flame. Fry 2 sliced onions, raisins, and cashew nuts until the onions turn brown. Lower the flame. Scoop them out, and leave them on a paper towel to soak up the extra oil.

Step 2

Add the whole spices to the same pan and give them a quick fry.

Step 3

Drain off the water from the rice, and add it to the pan. Stir gently, and fry to get the rice to a crispy texture. Add boiling water to the pan to cook the rice your are using. Squeeze one lime, add salt, and mix well.

Step 4

Switch off the flame once the rice is cooked just enough.

Layering biryani

Step 1

Now we'll bring together all these elements to complete our biriyani. From the pan, transfer half of the cooked rice to a bowl. Evenly spread the cooked chicken masala on top of the remaining rice in the pan. Now spread the remaining rice on the chicken masala. Now we a layer of rice, a layer of chicken masala, and another layer of rice.

Step 2

Garnish with the fried onions, sultanas, and cashew nuts that we had kept aside. Close the lid. Cover tightly along the edges with aluminium foil. You can place something heavy on the lid to make it airtight. On a low flame, cook again for 10 minutes. Switch off the flame, open the lid, and serve the biriyani hot. accompanied with raita, papad, and green chilly chutney.

Tips

1. Plan & Make Ahead: Fried onions can be made ahead of time- the previous day & store in an air tight containes.

2. Garam masala can be made ahead of time- the previous day & store in an air tight container.

3. Ground the ginger/garlic/green chilies the previous day & store in the refrigerator.

This way, it will be much easier to make this biryani.