Gayathri's Cook Spot: Hyderabadi Vegetable Dum Biryani

For this month's Daring Cook's Challenge, a non blogging member of the daring cooks - Grace, challenged us with a delicious dish from India- Biryani. She had given us 5 variations of biryani among which one was vegetable and all the others with chiciken, lamb and fish. I opted the vegatable biryani but didn't try out her recipe. Hyderabadi Vegetable biryani has been in my list for long since it was announced as a challenge in SNC for the northern team. So I thought this would be the perfect occasion for trying this out. Hyderabadi biryani is a layered biryani and can be finally cooked in oven to merge the flavours. Once I saw the recipe on Vahrevah and followed it. But no one liked it as the vegetables were very big and didn't merge with the dish. I came across a recipe at Swasthis's blog and looking at the final dish I was tempted to try. She had all the step wise photos and even a recipe for the biryani spice powder. I made it on a Sunday and fortunately I had some guests that day. So I was so happy to serve them this along with onion raitha and mushroom varuval. We had a filling lunch and finally completed it with a kesar pista kulfi. Sounds fun right?

Recipe Source: Swasthi

For The Spice Powder:

Black Pepper-1 1/2 tsp

Cinnamon-5 2" sticks

Coriander Seeds-4 tbs

Grated Nutmeg-1/2 tsp

Cauliflower-8 small florets

Button Mushroom-8-10

Coriander Leaves-1/3 cup

Biryani Masala Powder-1 1/2 tsp

Red Chilly Powder-1/3 tsp

Turmeric Powder-1/2 tsp

Yogurt/ Curd- 2 cups

Saffron Strands-a few

Coriander Leaves-1/3 cup

For The Spice Powder:

1. In a pan dry roast all the ingredients until aromatic.

2. Grind it to a fine powder.

3. Cool and transfer to an air tight jar. Use it while making biryani.

1. Wash and soak rice for 30 minutes.

2. In a pan add rice, shahi jeera, salt, oil and 8 cups of water.

3. Allow it to boil.

4. Keep on checking the rice.

5. When it is cooked, pour it into a metal strainer.

6. Drain water and fluff the rice with a fork.

1. Heat ghee and add all the spices.

2. Saute for a minute and add garlic and ginger paste.

3. When ghee separates, add the vegetables.

4. Saute for 2 minutes.

5. Add the spice powder, red chilly powder, turmeric powder and salt.

6. Saute for a minute.

7. Now add 1 cup of curd and mix it well.

8. Cover and cook until the vegetables are done.

9. Keep on stirring until the masala becomes dry.

10. Add coriander leaves and mix. Keep it aside.

For The Fried Onions:

1. Slice 2 onions into thin long slices.

2. Heat oil in a pan and deep fry the slices until brown and crispy.

3. Drain and keep it aside.

4. Fry the almonds, cashew nuts and raisins until golden.

5. Drain and keep it aside.

Assembling The Biryani:

1. In a heavy bottomed pan ( use an aluminium pan with out any handles as it will go inside the oven), add 1/2 the vegetable masala and 1 cup of curd. Mix well and spread it out evenly on the bottom.

2. Top with 1/3 rd of fried onions, almonds, cashew and raisins.

3. Now add 1/2 the rice on the masala and spread it out even;ly.

4. Now spread the remaining masala over the rice and top with 1/3 rd of garnish.

5. Add the remaining rice and press it well.

6. Garnish with the remaining nuts, fried onions and coriander.

7. Soak saffron in milk for 10 minutes.

8. Pour this milk over the rice evenly.

9. Preheat oven to 175C.

10. Cover the pan with aluminium foil.

11. Place it in hot oven and bake for 20-25 minutes.

12. Remove from oven.

13. At the time of serving transfer the layers to a serving bowl, give a gentle stir, garnish with coriander leaves and serve hot.