Vegetable Biryani

Vegetable biryani is a traditional Indian dish made with Basmathi rice - flavors of fresh vegetables and aromatic spices. For us the weekend never gets over without this spicy dish. Biryani can be prepared in lot more varieties and this biryani is my mom's recipe, easy to prepare and delicious to eat. Look out for step by step procedure below.

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Preparation time: 30 min
Cooking time: 30 min
Serving: 2
Category: Lunch
Cuisine: Indian
Author: Vidhya

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Ingredients

To Grind

Green chilli - 4 to 5 (depending on how spicy you want)

Ginger - 1 inch
Garlic - 4 pods
Mint leaves - a handful
Coriander leaves - a handful

To Pressure Cook

Basmathi rice - approx. 200 grms or 3/4 cup

Carrot - 2 chopped lengthwise

Beans - 15 Chop into big pieces

potato - 2 Medium sized, cubed

Onion - 1 chopped lengthwise

Cauliflower - 100 grms (Optional)

Sweet corn - a handful

Spices

Bay leaf - 2

Cinnamon stick - 1 inch

Star anise - 1

Cardamom - 3 nos

Cloves - 4 nos

Turmeric powder - 1/2 table spoon
Salt - 1 1/2 table spoon or as per your taste
Ghee - 2 table spoon

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Method

• Soak basmathi rice in water for about 30 min.
  
• Adding cauliflower is totally optional. If you are adding them, clean the cauliflower florets first. In a cooking vessel, take enough water to submerge the cauliflower, add a table spoon of salt and a generous pinch of turmeric powder in water and allow it to boil. Add cauliflower to the boiling water and cook for 10 min. Strain water from cauliflower and keep it aside.
• Grind ingredients mentioned in To Grind section, add little water while grinding.
  
• Chop Vegetables and keep ready. 
  
  
• In a pressure cooker, add 2 table spoon of ghee, when it becomes hot add bay leaf, cinnamon stick, star anise, cardamom and cloves.
  
  
• Fry until spices become aromatic. Add onions, fry it until slightly brown or becomes transparent. Cook it in medium heat.
  
• Add Ground paste to the pressure cooker. Stir it until you see bubbles.
  
• Now add chopped vegetables and cooked cauliflower.
  
• Give a stir and add turmeric powder.
  
• Now add soaked rice to the content, stir it carefully without breaking the rice.
  
• Add 1 1/2 cup of water. Add salt and give a stir. Taste the water, it should be little salty. Once the rice is cooked the salt will be adjusted.
  
• Close the lid and pressure cook for 15-16 min in medium heat.
• Let the pressure comes down by itself. Leave the lid closed for another 10 - 15 min to retain the flavour.
• Fluff up the rice and serve hot and spicy vegetable biryani with Raitha (Click the like to see how to prepare onion and tomato raitha).
  

Notes:

1. Instead of water you can add coconut milk. Grind the coconut by adding water to it. Squeeze the coconut milk and discard the pulp. Add 1 cup of coconut milk instead of water.
2. You can any add vegetable of your choice. You can add green peas instead of sweet corn.