Chicken Dum Biriyani

Ingredients:

Basmati Rice - 500 gm
Chicken - 500 gm with bone
Oil - 3/4 cup
Onion - 3 large, thinly sliced 
Saffron - a pinch
Warm Milk - 1/4 cup

Thick Curd - 50 gm

Turmeric Powder - 2 teaspoon 

Kashmiri Mirch Powder - 1 teaspoon 

Green Chillies - 4, broken into big pieces
Mint Leaves(optional) - 1/4 cup finely chopped
Ghee - 3 tablespoon
Boiled eggs- 5
Boiled potatoes- 5 (cut into halves)
Kewra Essence - few drops
Rose Essence - few drops

Whole garammasala like - 1 cinnamon(1"), 2 cardamom, 4 clove, 6 black pepper

Hot water - 500ml 

Bay leaf - 2
Salt to taste

For Marination:
Chilli Powder - 2 tblspn
Salt to taste
Thick Curd - 50gm
Ginger Garlic Paste - 3 tablespoon
Special Garam Masala Powder - 2 tablespoon (recipe below)

Lemon Juice - 1 tablespoon

For Special Garam Masala Powder:
Cardamom - 2
Cinnamon - 2, each 1"
Clove - 4
Peppercorn - 4
Nutmeg(jayfal) -1
Mace(jayitri) - 3 or 4 blades
Star anise - 1
Fennel seed - 2 teaspoon 

Method:

Take cardamom, cinnamon, clove,peppercorn,mace,nutmeg,fennel seed,bay leaf and star anise, dry roast them. Let it cool down first, then grind it to a fine powder. Set aside the special garammasala powder.

Soak saffron in some luke-warm milk and keep that aside. 

Start marinating the chicken with all the ingredients given, along with 1 tablespoon of special garammasala powder. Let it sit for half an hour.

Wash and soak basmati rice for an hour.
Bring lots of water with salt to a boil. Once it boils, add bay leaves and whole garammasala and after some time add in the drained rice; cook till it is 80% done. When you taste it, it should have a bite.Drain it and set aside.

Heat oil and ghee together in a big pot in which you are making the biryani.Add in onions and fry till golden to make that BERESTA. Now, add turmeric powder and kashmiri mirch powder along with a teaspoon of salt and mix well. Now, add 500ml hot water to it and put the potato halves to get boiled. Cover the pot and wait till the potatoes get 80% boiled and pick them up from the onion gravy. 

Now,add the marinated chicken into the gravy. Add a pinch of special garammasala powder. Add salt if needed. Cover the pot again and let it cook 60% for 8-10 minutes. 

After the chicken gets cooked, add previously boiled potatoes and layer the rice over it, top with BERESTA(fried onions), saffron milk, boiled eggs and with the ghee, kewra and rose essence.Sprinkle 1 teaspoon of that special garammasala powder.Cover the entire pot with foil and cover with a plate. 

Place a flat iron tawa on the wok,put the biryani-filled pot on it and place a heavy weight over it. Let it cook on a very high flame for the first 10 minutes and then on low flame for the last 15 minutes.

Finally, switch off the oven and rest the pot on the tawa for 10 more minutes for the perfect DUM.

Now remove both the weight and the foil from the pot and fluff the rice carefully. Serve it hot with green salad.

Notes:

1)Soaking rice and marination chicken is very important, so never skip it.
2)Use good quality basmati rice for this.

3)Cooking the rice perfectly is important. If you over cook it, the the whole biryani will be mushy. SO stand near the rice and keep checking it, after you add rice to boiling water, it will just take 7 to 10 minutes for the rice to get 80% cooked which is actually needed for the biryani.