This is among the most popular Indian / Pakistani dish which I have had the pleasure to eat whilst I was on a vacation in India.
It is historically kept for special events such as parties, weddings, holidays.
To know more about Biryani we need to go back into the past. An description of Biryani follows…
Mughals great liking for food & the availability of the great choice of Spices in India led to this fusion type preparation.
In the Mughal food traditions, biryani means rice made together with lamb meat but now chicken biryani has also become one of the most popular type of biryani. Even chicken biryani has too several variations and this is the purpose that I am writing the whole article to this delightful dish.
Biryani is a fragrant rice dish prepared from a mix of Spices, Nuts, Cream, Yogurt, long-grained Basmati rice and Meat. This dish is an example off fine culinary art, hence it is cooked with perfection. The name is derived from the Farsi word Birian, which is frying of the rice in oil before washing. This procedure of rice frying makes the rice slightly nutty and it imparts a pleasant taste. Based on the name, and the cooking style the dish originated in Persia or Arabia. Along with huge number of pasttales, biryani is associated with some legends as well. One has it that Timor ‘the Lame’ brought it down from Kazakhstan via Afghanistan to north India. According to another fable, Mumtaz Mahal created this dish as a wholesome meal to feed the Mughal emperor’s army. Gradually this well-liked dish has started leaving its footprint in almos tall Indian cuisines, such as Awadi, Lucknavi and Bengali cuisines. The popularity of chicken biryani is still dominant in the country as well as in global cuisines and various modern cooking styles are incorporated to make the recipe more palatable
There are 2 fundamental types of Biryanis: Kutchi and Pukki.
Kutchi- This technique makes use of uncooked ingredients. Uncooked chicken and raw rice are layered along with spices and curry and kept on low fire to cook. Dum Pukht or Dum is the most refined form of cooking that has been developed and vastly used in cooking of Biryanis. In Dum style, meat and rice is cooked over low-flame without adding water, in the meats own juices and bone marrow.
Pukki- In this technique cooked meat and rice are used Pukki style incorporates the separate cooking of rice and meat, then layering together.
South Indian biryanis are prepared with Kutchi method while North style biryanis are prepared through Pukki.
Though the procedure of making Chicken biryani is time-consuming but the resultant dish is every time wonderful. The secret of preparing a wonderful chicken biryani is all in the spices. I personally recommend using Basmati rice. It’s thin and a fine grain rice which can be used for a variety of purposes.