Vegetable Biryani-Layered Style

Happy new year to all. May your dreams come true in this season :)

For me the month of december was a "biryani month" because of varieties of biryanis. I prepared mutton, chicken, fish and vegetable biryani on December and so the name "biryani month". Due to various reasons i couldn't take any snaps and finally with vegetable biryani, i didn't give up and took those shots to share with my readers…

For the below recipe, i referred vahchef and one of my cookbook.

Ingredients:

Carrot	1(medium,chopped lengthwise)
Beans	10(chopped lengthwise)
Potato	1(small,chopped lengthwise)
Green peas(frozen)	1/4 cup
Cauliflower	1/2 cup(flower shaped florets)
Big Onion	2(big, chopped lengthwise)
Mint leaves	1/4 cup+1/2 cup
Coriander leaves	1/4 cup+1/2 cup
Yogurt	1/4 cup +3/4 cup
Cashewnuts	10(sauteed in ghee)
Ginger garlic paste	1 tbl spoon
Green chillies	5(medium,chopped lengthwise)
Biryani masala	2 tbl spoon
Chilly powder	1 tbl spoon
Pepper powder	1 tbl spoon
Turmeric powder	1 tspoon
Salt	to taste
Ghee	1 tspoon+2 tbl spoon

To Cook Rice:

Basmathi Rice	2 cup
Oil	2 tbl spoon
Bay leaves	2
Cardamom	2
Cloves	2
Cinnamon	1inch stick
Cumin seed	1 tspoon
Salt	1 tspoon

To Temper:

Oil	2 tbl spoon
Bay leaves	2
Cardamom	2
Cloves	3
Cinnamon	1inch stick

Preparation:

(1) Soak rice in water for about 30 minutes or more. Drain the water. Now in a cooking vessel add water and allow to boil. When water starts boiling add oil, whole garam masalas, salt and cumin seeds. Now add the soaked rice into it (refer the picture). Cook till the rice is 80% done (This will be done in some 5 to 7 minutes since we soaked the rice already). Drain the water completely( you can cook the rice in your own way till 80% done). Keep it aside.

(2) Mean while chop all the vegetables. The vegetables should be chopped lengthwise in medium thickness so that it won't shrinks much when you saute it in oil. Keep it aside.

(3) Heat ghee in a pan and add the cashews. Saute it till golden color. Keep it aside. In the same pan heat 1 tbl spoon of oil and add the chopped onion slices. Add little salt to it. Saute till the color of onion changes brownish. Remove from the pan and keep it aside.

(4) In the same pan add 2 tbl spoon of oil and heat it. Now add the whole garam masalas shown under "to temper" heading. When the flavor emanates add ginger garlic paste and saute till the raw smell goes off. Now add the chopped potato, beans and carrot. Saute it for 5 minutes.  To this add cauliflower and green peas along with green chillies, little salt and turmeric powder. Saute it till all the veggies are 80% cooked.

(5) To this add chilly powder, pepper powder and biryani masala. Mix well so that the raw smell of masalas will goes off and it will coat with the vegetables. Finally add 1/4 cup of yogurt and mix well so that it coats well with the masalas and veggies (Make a salt test). Now add mint leaves and coriander leaves. Saute once and switch off the flame. Keep it aside.

(6) Now you have to cook the biryani in layered style.Since we follow dum style, the bottom part of biryani won't get burnt. For this take a wide bottomed pan than the cooking vessel. Pour little water to the wide pan and heat the vessel in the stove. Keep the biryani cooking vessel above it (you can also use a dosa tawa instead of a wide pan) . Add ghee to the cooking vessel. Spread half of the cooked veggies to it. Add yogurt and salt to it and mix once.

(7) Spread fried cashews above it. To the top add half of the cooked onion.

(8) Above it spread the half of the cooked rice. Spread some mint leaves and coriander leaves above it. Now repeat with veggies.

 (9) Again top with onion, rice, mint leaves and coriander leaves one above the other.

(10) Close the vessel with  a lid. The lid should be perfect fit to the cooking vessel so that it won't let the steam out while cooking (You can keep some weight like rice pack over the lid, if the lid is not perfect :) ). Allow to cook in medium flame for about 20 minutes. Shake the vessel in between.

You can garnish with cashewnuts/fried bread pieces. Have it with Raita/Pickle/Pappadam..

Tips and Variations:

• You can use store bought fried onion instead of onion.
• You can add paneer if you want. Add towards the end of vegetables.
• Use orange food color for additional color.