Vegetable Biriyani Recipe | How to make Vegetable Biriyani

Vegetable Biriyani is one of the rich variety rice in Indian Cuisine. Vegetable rich rice with aromatic spices gives a wonderful flavour for the dish. The main difference between Pulao and Biriyani is that Biriyani has layers. Biriyani has a layer of vegetables sandwiched between 2 layers of rice.

Vegetable Biriyani Recipe | How to make Vegetable Biriyani
Generally biriyani is cooked in low flame for sometime so that the layers gets cooked nicely and all the flavours gets nicely absorbed. Its been so long I have been thinking of publishing this recipe. But everytime I was so absentminded and missed to take snap of few steps and hence I have not published. This time, I am so cautious and took all the snaps and hence I am sharing step by step photos and instructions of how to make the popular and hyderabadi style Vegetable Biriyani.

Vegetable Biriyani Recipe | How to make Vegetable Biriyani



Preparation and Yield:
Preparation time 20 mins
Cooking Time 45 mins
Servings 5

Vegetable Biriyani Recipe | How to make Vegetable Biriyani
Ingredients:
Basmati Rice 1 Cups**
Mint Leaves 1/2 Cup
Onion 3 medium sized
Carrot 1
Beans 10-12
Potato 2 medium sized
Green Peas 1/4 Cup
Ginger-Garlic Paste 1 tablespoon
Broccoli Florets 1/2 Cup
Sour Curd 3/4 Cup
Garam Masala 3 teaspoon
Cardamom Powder 1 teaspoon
Saffron Threads 10
Green Chillies 2
Red Chilli Powder 1 teaspoon
Bay Leaf 3
Shahi Jeera / Cumin Seeds 2 teaspoon
Salt To taste
Oil 1/4 Cup
Ghee 2 tablespoon
Whole Black Pepper 1 teaspoon
Turmeric Powder 1/4 teaspoon

Vegetable Biriyani Recipe | How to make Vegetable Biriyani
Method:

1. Peel and Chop the onions to thin slices. Peel and chop the potatoes into bigger cubes. Peel and carrot into bigger pieces. Chop the beans into half inch pieces. Soak the basmati rice in water for 15 minutes. The onions need to be deep fried in oil till they are golden brown color. Take these onions and keep it in a paper towel to drain excess oil

Add 1 tablespoon of oil in another pan and add pepper corns and shahi jeera. Shahi jeera has less aroma than the normal cumin seeds and we don't want jeera aroma to dominate much in biriyani. Thats the reason we add shahi jeera. Add chopped carrots and potatoes and saute in high flame for 5 minutes.

Now, add ginger-garlic paste along with salt and mix well. Then we need to slit green chillies and along with turmeric powder, red chilli powder, 1 teaspoon of garam masala and 1/2 teaspoon of cardamom powder and give it a good mix

Switch off the flame. Then add green peas and chopped beans. We don't want the vegetables to fully cook. We want the vegetables to be little crunchy and fresh. After adding beans and peas, add curd to the pan. If you don't have sour curd, then you can add 1 tablespoon of lemon juice along with curd.

Mix the curd and vegetables nicely and add 10-12 mint leaves along with 1 tablespoon of ghee.

Finally add 1/3rd of the friend onions and mix everything well and cover the pan with a lid. Now our vegetables are ready which forms our 1 layer of biriyani. We now need to concentrate on the rice cooking. Add 2 tablespoon of warm water to saffron threads and keep it aside

Bring 3.5 cups of water to boil. When the water starts to boil, add bay leaf along with 1 teaspoon of shahi jeera and salt. Drain the water from rice and add it to the boiling water. Keep stirring the rice occasionally without breaking the grains. When the rice is 60% cooked, we are going to add half of the rice to the vegetables in the pan. We can take a grain of rice and press it with fingers, If the rice gets little mashed without breaking, then our rice is done. We don't need to cook fully. When this consistency is achieved, using a ladle or spatula, take half quantity of rice and spread it over the vegetables in another pan. Do not drain the water from rice at this stage. Let the remaining rice gets cooked in the water

Spread the half quantity of half-cooked rice gently and nicely so that it forms a layer above the vegetable layer. On top of the spread rice, spread / sprinkle 1 teaspoon of garam masala along with 1/2 teaspoon of cardamom powder. Then sprinkle half of the saffron thread water. Then add 1/3rd of the fried onions to the pan.

Next, to the pan add broccoli florets. Spread the florets nicely. Again add 10-12 mint leaves. Now our second layer of biriyani is ready. Switch off the flame of the rice and drain the water from rice using a strainer. Now you could see the rest of the half quantity rice is almost 85 % cooked. Add this to the top of second layer of biriyani

Now add the rest of onions along with rest of garam masala, remaining saffron water and threads along with few mint leaves. Add the rest of the ghee to the sides of the pan and cover the pan with a lid and keep it flame.

Let the biriyani gets cooked in high flame for 2 minutes, then reduce the flame and cook it for another 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, switch off the flame. Using a spatula, check if you have any water. Generally there wouldn't be any water. But If you have any water, again keep the rice in low flame till all the water are absorbed. Cover the pan with the lid till you serve. While serving, don't mix the rice. Using a flat spatula, gently take the rice from the sides of the pan so that all the layers are nicely piled up.

Serve the mouth-watering and fluffy Vegetable Biriyani with your favourite raithas and slurp!!!

Vegetable Biriyani Recipe | How to make Vegetable Biriyani