Its Biriyani time

After enduring one of the worst weeks in my recent memory in terms of up and down moods, I decided cooking may not be a bad diversion to undertake. Of course I needed something substantially challenging to distract me. Chicken Biriyani fit the bill perfectly.

Now I don’t cook anything remotely like this at home, hence I had to spend close to 30 minutes analyzing the recipe ( very detailed one too ) sent across by my US consultant. After a deep dive assessment, I concluded that a major shopping expedition was the order of the day. All I seemed to have at home was Rice, chilly powder and salt !!

And yes, I also had a few wilted out curry leaves in my fridge, some of them seemed to have a rather bright green tinge to them. Any of them salvageable, perhaps ? A closer inspection revealed without a shadow of doubt that the greenness was due to my familiar adversary – fungus. A deeper inspection of my fridge revealed several more life forms, at the mere sight of which many a human being might have fainted. The sticker saying “Danger: Men Cooking” is not stuck on my fridge without reason :-) Had to undertake a ruthless purging of my fridge before I proceeded any further.

Now this unexpected task being complete, off I went to the market. Chicken, biriyani masala, poppy seeds, coriander leaves, mint leaves, curry leaves, green chillies …. The list was endless. After 2 hours of zipping into multiple shops, I was ready with all the ingredients. A brief moment of panic occurred in between when I realized I had no clue what  the Indian equivalent of mint leaves was. The girl in reliance fresh was clueless. I had to invoke ‘phone-a-punjabi-friend’ option and was promptly told to look for Pudina.

I am telling you, this was one of the messiest dishes I made ever. The chicken had to marinated in some masala, onions had to be fried, tomatoes had to be added, cashew nuts had to be fried as well, some more onions had to be caramelized , rice had to be cooked, several other pastes involving all kinds of leaves, poppy seeds, ginger , garlic etc had to be ground .. Phew, a lot of work ..

But the master chef is not one who shies away from a bit of hard labor, especially if the promise of a spectacular new dish looms.

To be frank ( which I am not, I am Pradeep) I ran into some trouble while making it. I had doubts on how exactly to caramelize the onions [you keep on frying them for a long time, increase heat towards end] and whether it is ok to puree tomato and use it rather than use the small pieces, which I hate [finally used the puree]. I made the dish in the afternoon, so it would have been well past midnight for my US consultant. I tried my local consultant, but quite unsurprisingly she was found to be shamelessly sleeping like a log and unresponsive. Thankfully my engineering approximations caused no harm to the end product.

Took me well over 2 hours to make. Was it worth all the effort ? Well, you look and tell me ….

Ended up with a touch less salt. Always better to be in that position than land up with more salt !!

Tasted good to me… Fully dedicated to US consultant for the excellent detailed recipe.

Well, did that success help my mood ? I don’t know, I don’t care.

I have tasted success in first attempt, Yipppeeeeeeeeeee ….

Now that means, I have to find a new project. Wonder what I should try next ?