Chicken Dum Biryani

Bakrid or Id-ul-Zuha is one of the most celebrated festivals among Muslims all over the world. It is a festival of great rejoice and of sacrifice, celebrated with traditional fervour and gaiety in India.

This year is the most happiest Bakrid for me, as my parents went for Hajj and my in-laws are with us to celebrate this festival.

Since I always cook my usual biryani recipe on all such occassions, I wanted to try out something different this time around. While I was searching for recipes, I bumped into this chicken biryani recipe in one of my cookery books called "Pachakam". This recipe is originally from Samvrutha Sunil, listed in the cookbook as one of her favorite biryani recipes.

Ingredients:

for Rice:

1. Basmathi rice- 4 cups
2. Ghee- 4 tbsp
3. Onions(sliced)- 2 nos
4. Water- 41/2 cups
5. Cashewnuts- 25 gms
6. Raisins- 25 gms
7. Cinnamon- 2 nos
8. Cloves- 4 nos
9. Cardamoms- 3 nos
10. Salt- as per taste

for Masala:

1. Chicken pieces- 1 kg
2. Ghee- 2 tbsp
3. Oil- 2 tbsp
4. Onions(sliced)- 3 nos
5. Tomatoes(sliced)- 3 nos
6. Green Chillies- 4/5 nos
7. Ginger(crushed)- 2 tbsp
8. Garlic(chopped)- 2 tbsp
9. Cinnamon- 2 nos
10. Cloves- 4 nos
11. Coriander Leaves(chopped)- 1/4 cup
12. Mint Leaves(chopped)- 1/4 cup
13. Coriander Powder- 1 tsp
14. Pepper Powder- 1tsp
15. Fennel Seeds-1/2 tsp
16. Salt- as per taste

Method for Rice:

1. Wash rice several times and drain it.
2. Now add little more ghee and fry onions until golden and keep them in a bowl.This is used at last.
3. Keep a pressure cooker and pour remaining ghee. when it is hot add cloves, cinnamon and cardamoms along with drained rice. 
4. Fry for 3 min.
5. Add water and pressure cook for upto 4 whistles.

Method for Seasoning:

1. In a non-stick pan, add little ghee and fry the cashews until golden colour.
2. Remove them and drain on kitchen towel.
3. In the same ghee, fry the raisins until they puff up and mix them along with cashews.

Method for Chicken Masala:

1. Wash chicken and place it in a colander to drain of all water.
2. Grind the masala ingredients (6-15 in the table above) to a paste.
3. Heat a large pan and add oil + ghee.
4. Saute onions. When the onion turns golden brown, add tomatoes and fry well.
5. At this point, add the ground paste (step 2 above) and mix well.
6. Now add the drained chicken pieces along with salt and mix futher. Place the lid and let it cook well.
7. Do not add water to chicken since there will be lots of water draining from the meat.
8. After the chicken is cooked, there will be a little bit of water left. Do not drain it.

Now for layering,

1. Divide the rice in three parts and masala into two parts.
2. Take a large heavy base vessel and rub it with oil or ghee. Layer the bottom of the vessel with first part of rice.
3. Spread the first part of chicken masala on top of the rice layer.
4. Repeat this layering for all portions of masala and rice.
5. Finally, pour the water ( which is left while cooking chicken) on top of the layered biryani.
6. At the end of layering, sprinkle the fried onions and dum it with a wet cloth or with dough and place the lid.
7. Place some sort of heavy object (i use my marble mortar) on top of the lid so that the steam and thus the aroma stays inside the vessel.
8. Heat a tawa and place this large vessel on the tawa and cook on low heat for 15-20 mins.
9. Now the biryani is ready to be served.