Hyderabadi Mutton Biryani

Homemade Hyderabadi Mutton Biryani

Serves: 3 - 4

Preparation Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 1 1/2 hours

Ingredients

For the mutton:

300 g onions, sliced
75 ml oil
200 ml yogurt/ curd
2 teaspoon ginger - garlic paste ( fresh and homemade )
1 teaspoon red chilli powder
1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
25 g coriander leaves
10 g mint leaves
2 green chillies
Juice of 2 lemon
1/2 teaspoon green cardamom powder
3 cloves
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon powder
1/2 teaspoon mace ( javitri ) powder
1 teaspoon garam masala powder
1 teaspoon caraway seeds
1/2 teaspoon black pepper powder
3/4 teaspoon salt ( or to taste )
500 g mutton chops, washed and drained

For the rice:

4 black cardamom
3 cloves
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon fennel seeds
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups ( 400 g ) basmati rice
5 cups water
1/2 teaspoon ghee

For assembling:

1/2 teaspoon saffron, diluted in 1/4 cup ( 45 ml ) milk
1 tablespoon ghee

Method

For the mutton:

Fry onions in oil till golden brown. when cool, crush and set aside.

Blend the remaining ingredients with half of fried and crushed onions and rub this marinade on the meat. Set aside for 30 minutes.

Put marinated meat in heavy bottomed pan. Keep stirring on medium heat till it comes to a boil. Cover and cook for 35 - 45 minutes or till done.

For Rice:

Put all spices and ghee in water and boil. Add rice, and drain when half done ( do not overcook rice. Each rice grain should be separated ).

To assemble:

Put the cooked meat in a large pan, and spread the parboiled rice over it. Drizzle saffron milk over it. Sprinkle reserved fried onion and ghee. Cover tightly and cook over low heat.

Or try this method

Dum method:

In a heavy - bottomed vessel or biryani pot, spread a layer of meat masala and half portion of cooked rice Make 2 layers with cooked rice and meat masala. Sprinkle 2 tablespoon ghee , saffron solution and reserved fried onion.

Cover with a tight lid. Seal with maida dough on the edges of the lid. Heat a heavy - bottomed iron kadai. Keep biryani pot over it. Cook on a low heat for 25 - 30 minutes. You can find a color change on the maida seal. Open the seal carefully. Serve with hot.

Mutton Biryani

A Biryani preparation has a lot of versions, originating from different parts of India. The one that we are going to learn today is a ‘Mutton Biryani’ an absolute top draw.

Ingredients
Marination

• 2 lbs Goat meat cut into pieces
• ¾ – 1 cup yogurt
• 2 tbsp Ginger Garlic Paste
• 2 tsp Chili Powder
• 14 small Chilies split into two (adjust to your taste)
• 1 cup chopped Mint Leaves
• 1 cup chopped Cilantro
• Salt to Taste (sufficient for the meat)
• Garam Masala Powder
• 10 Pepper Corns
• 10 Cloves
• ½ tsp Cardamom Seeds
• ½ tsp Sahajeera or Black Cumin
• 1” Cinnamon Stick
• 1 Large Onion sliced
• 1 Lime
• 1 cup Oil (can use half oil and half ghee)
• ½ tsp of saffron strands
• ½ cup milk
• 4 cups Basmati Rice soaked for 30 minutes (rice cooker measuring cup)

Spices for boiling rice

• 6 Cardamoms
• 3 Cloves
• 2 Bay Leaves
• 1 Bay Flower or Biryani Flower
• 1 tsp Sahajeera
• ½ tsp Ginger Garlic Paste
• 1 tbsp of Oil
• First Full of Salt

Preparation:

• Clean and cut the goat meat.
• Grind all the ingredients listed under garam masala to a fine powder.
• Mix all the ingredients of the marinade and marinate for at least 2 hour , preferably overnight in the fridge.
• Cook the meat with ½ the oil in a pressure cooker. Don’t add any water when cooking. In my cooker it takes 6-7 whistles and 5 minutes on low flame to cook. Let it cool. Once the pressure in the cooker goes away, open it and cook it until all the water evaporates. OR
• Can cook the meat on the stove top until tender. This will take about an hour. I prefer the pressure cooker to avoid the cooking odor by cooking on stove top.
• Squeeze the lime juice on the meat and mix well.
• In a pan, heat oil and fry the onions until light golden brown.
• Soak saffron in hot milk.
• In a big pot bring water to a boil, add all the spices required for boiling rice and mix well.
• Add rice and continue to cook until the rice is almost done. It takes about 7-8 minutes on my stove. Drain the rice and keep aside.
• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
• Now its time to arrange rice and meat in layers. Grease large baking tray with oil, layer half the rice at the bottom. Sprinkle some oil, fried onions and ½ the saffron milk. Layer the rice with meat followed by a layer of remaining rice. We should have 2 layers of rice and one layer of meat. Top it off the remaining oil, fried onions and saffron milk. Cover the tray with aluminum foil.
• Bake the biryani for 10 minutes on 400 degrees F and then for 20 minutes on 350 degrees F. The total bake time is 30 minutes, 10 minutes on 400F and 20 minutes on 350 F.
• Mix the rice and serve it hot with raita or chicken shorva /mutton shorva