Keema Biryani, biryani with a twist
Keema Biryani is a delicious and flavourful dish that combines spiced minced meat (keema) with aromatic rice. It is packed with flavour and there is something very alluring about rice and keema, I just love it.
Ingredients
Ingredients for Keema Biryani masala
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 onion sliced (deep fried until golden brown)
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- 1 tsp garlic, finely chopped
- 1 tsp ginger, finely chopped
- 0.5 tsp turmeric powder
- 0.25 tsp red chilli powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp coriander seeds
- 0.5 tsp cumin seeds
- 1 tsp garam masala
- 0.5 tsp paprika optional
- 500 grams lamb mince
- 2 green chillies, finely chopped
- 1/3 tin of chopped tomatoes, finely chopped (I use a food processor)
- 1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
- 250 ml natural yoghurt, whipped (1 cup)
Ingredients for Biryani rice
- 1 tsp cumin seeds
- 1 cinnamon bark (1 inch long)
- 2 black cardamoms
- 3 cloves
- 4 black peppercorns
- 3 green cardamoms
- 1 tsp coriander seeds
- 1.5 tsp salt
- 800 grams basmati rice (3 mugs) I like using Tilda Pure Basmati rice
- water
- 2 tbsp yellow food colouring
- 2 bullet chilli peppers, sliced in half optional
Instructions
- Wash the rice and leave to soak in cold water, for at least 30 minutes or ideally 2 hours.
- Add the oil to a pan on medium heat, then brown the finely chopped onion. Once browned, add the garlic and ginger and stir through.
- Next add the masala spices, tomatoes and green chillies and stir through. Add splashes of water if the mixture is too dry. Let it cook for a few minutes.
- Then add the lemon juice and mince lamb meat. Break the mince up so it browns properly, let it cook for 10 minutes. After this time, the oil should start to separate from the masala.
- Turn the oven on 50C. In large saucepan filled with around 2.5 litres of water, bring it to boil. This will be used to cook the rice.
- Next add the yoghurt to the keema pan and stir through. Then turn the heat down and cover the pan with the lid. Cook for a further 10 minutes. Again after this time, the oil will separate again.
- Once the water in the rice pan has boiled, add the soaked rice, rice spices (you can use a spice infuser/strainer) and bullet chilli peppers. Cook until the rice is cooked.
- Once the rice has cooked (this should take around 10 minutes), drain the excess water off in a large sieve.
- Next we need to start layering the rice and the keema biryani masala. Add half of the rice back into the large rice saucepan and add two or three drops of yellow food colouring, spread gently with a fork. You don't want all the rice to be yellow, a mix of yellow and white is perfect.
- Next add all the keema masala on top of the rice. Then add some of the fried onions on top of the keema. Spread it across the pan to make a full keema masala, onion layer.
- Then add the remaining rice on top of the keema, again add 2-3 drops of yellow food colouring on the rice and spread gently with the fork. Add the remaining fried onions on top of the rice.
- Then cover the saucepan with a lid and put in oven for steaming "dum" for 30 minutes, this really lets everything meld together and enhances the flavours.
- Then serve immediately with boondi raita and enjoy!
