Topic: Chicken biryani

[George]

I bought my first Indian take away for ages last night - a chicken biryani. I watched them cook it and when I arrived home, I took some photos and tried to ascertain what was in the vegetable sauce, which nearly always comes with a BIR biryani.

Observations:
1. The cooking process was hectic/busy and full flame was applied to each pan (1st pan for biryani, 2nd pan for veg sauce) the whole time, other than when the chef took the pans across the room to put in various ingredients. There was plenty of flambe. He put in more different ingredients than I'd expected for each dish, at various stages, out of plastic containers on a table. It was so fast, I defy anybody to ascertain either (a) what each ingredient was and (b) how much quantity he took. I had quite a clear view of the process and it was impossible to follow, let alone remember or write notes.

2. The most useful thing I picked up was that the 'sauce' for the biryani itself (including the chicken, I'm not talking about the vegetable sauce here) was cooked for about five minutes. Then, white rice - presumably pre-cooked - was added and swirled around a bit for only a short while longer until heated through and thoroughly mixed into the 'sauce', before he tipped it all into the large foil container.

2. There were several large tubs of Pride vegetable ghee in the kitchen, so I think this particular place uses that, rather than vegetable oil.

3. The large foil container held 500ml of chicken biryani and the small foil container held 350ml of vegetable sauce.

4. Each dish had quite a large amount of fenugreek or coriander (??) dumped on top. Most of the fenugreek/coriander on the biryani stuck to the lid - please see photo. Is it fenugreek or coriander? I'm not sure. I should have done more homework before posting this!

5. I 'pulled apart' the vegetable sauce to see what was in it. From bottom left, clockwise - the main vegetable was squares of potato, then 1 level tbsp peas, a measly bit of cauliflower, 1 level tbsp carrot squares, some coriander or fenugreek, and some slices of onion. All in all, not much - no 'expensive' vegetables, like corgettes or anything.

The vegetable curry - my main interest here - was 'representative' of a BIR effort for that dish. Overall, I would rate the flavours from the whole meal as average - nothing special.

Regards
George

[George]

You can only post 4 photos at a time so here's the other one, referred to above - the vegetables picked out of the vegetable curry sauce.

Regards
George

[Mark J]

Nice account George (Its coriander by the way)

[DARTHPHALL]

Bloody hell look at all that Oil !!!
Secondly i agree 100% that its Coriander. ;D

[George]

Bloody hell look at all that Oil !!!
Secondly i agree 100% that its Coriander. ;D

Mark, Darth

Thank you for confirming that it's coriander, rather than fenugreek. I agree about the amount of oil but find that's typical of most BIR curries which I've ever had. It's the reason why I seldom order take-aways or visit BIRs for sit down meals these days.

Regards
George

[DARTHPHALL]

If you ever visit sunny Cornwall George i do recommend my fave BIR because they don't use much Oil.
Here is a link .............http://www.maharajah-restaurant.co.uk/

[George]

Darth

After your glowing reports over many months, I almost certainly will visit Maharajah restaurant if I'm ever in Newquay again. I stayed in the Headland Hotel there once, and would like to go back sometime. It's a good web site too, at:

http://www.maharajah-restaurant.co.uk/index.htm

Regards
George

[DARTHPHALL]

My top recommendations are the Vindalloo/Tindalloo (Very Hot !!),Biryani,Madras,Lasan Chicken,ChickenTikka/Tandoori.
DARTH.

[Yellow Fingers]

Hi George

Biryani is one I'm still trying to crack to my satisfaction and not really succeeding. I know the rice is pre-cooked cold pilau rice. You say you didn't catch much of what was happening, but did you see him put any base sauce into the Biryani rice and if so how much?

Also I've tried the pre-cooked vegetable method from the Kushi balti book and I felt that this was not far from the veg curry that is served with most biryanis. It's a little too flavoursome in a spicy way because of the whole spices used, but if these were omitted and a little base sauce were to be added I think it would make a passable veg curry to accompany the biryani. The secret is not to overdo the spicing.

[George]

YF

You were the one person I hoped this thread might help, as I know you share at least some of my enthusiasm for 'cracking' both elements of this dish.

I said I wasn't very impressed with the overall taste of the biryani in the photo. I couldn't help thinking it should be quite easy to surpass that at home, given tips picked up here at this forum.

>did you see him put any base sauce into the Biryani rice and if so how much?
I'm sorry I didn't, but I'm sure he used base sauce. He must have done. But it wasn't added to the rice. Rather, the rice was added to the base sauce, after lots of other ingredients had been added first. I'm sure it starts off like making a basic 'stage 2' curry. This special 'curry sauce', complete with chicken, took at least five minutes to make. Then, at the very end, the rice was tipped in and heated through.

My attempt at a chicken biryani will be to make one of the chicken madras curries like on this site, but with minimal chilli. Then tip in some rice. Just add rice gradually until the consistency of the overall biryani seems about right, i.e. not too moist.

>Also I've tried the pre-cooked vegetable method from the Kushi balti book
>and I felt that this was not far from the veg curry that is served with most biryanis.
This is very good news. I share the view that the techniques in the Kushi Balti book are probably of more use than the Kushi spicing. I will try substituting what I think is a correct (minimal) quantity of Rajah or some other curry powder and leave out most of the Kushi spice suggestions. For a start, I don't want a 'Balti' flavour!

Regards
George