1. Wash chicken and cut into desired pieces.
2. Then marinate chicken with curd, 1/2 tsp oil, 1 tsp salt for 40 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, cut onions and tomatoes into thin slices and keep aside.
4. Heat oil in an big vessel. Add onions and fry till light brown in color.
5. Add ginger-garlic paste and fry of couple of minutes.
6. Add turmeric powder and mix well with onions.
7. Now add marinated chicken to the vessel and mix well.
8. Fry for 3 to 4 minutes. Add needed salt as already some salt is added while marinating chicken. Mix and allow to cook for 3 to 4 minutes more.
9. Now add tomatoes and chilli powder, garam masala powder and coriander powder and mix all togeather well.
10. Close the lid and cook on medium heat untill all the tomato juice get into the chicken along with other masala.( Approx about 5 to6 minutes)
11. Open the lid and add required water if you want more gravy .(At this point you will come to know how much to add)
12. Finally add cilantro and sim the stove for 5 more minutes. Before swithching of the heat check for the salt and chicken is well cooked or not.

Note: Chicken is cooked very fast, so whole process may take 30 hr to 40 minutes

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Gudur Chicken

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Ingredients:

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Whole chicken

1 big onion

3 medium tomatoes (ripe)

1tbsp ginger-garlic -coconut paste ( grind ginger, garlic and dry coconut pieces togeather to make paste)

Corinader powder (Dhaniyala podi)

3 tsp chilli powder

2 tsp turmeric powder

3 to 4 cloves (lavangalu)

1 bay leaf

2 Cinnamon sticks (dalchina chekkalu)

salt as required

Oil for cooking

Method:

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1. Wash chicken and cut into small pieces(or as desired).
2. Take this washed chicken in a wide and deep container. Add turmeric powder and salt and mix well.
3. With out adding any water put this on stove and on medium heat with covered lid cook the chicken.
4. As chicken will release some water no need to add any water to it.
5. Cook until almost all the water is evaporated.
6. Add chilli powder at this stage and mix well. Do not put any spoon to mix it. Just mix it holding the container.
7. Decrease the heat and allow it to cook for 2 miuntes and remove from heat. Keep this aside.
8. Take an another vessel. Heat oil. Add cloves bay leaf and cinnamon sticks. Fry for few seconds
9. Now add onions and fry till light brown in color. Add ginger-garlic-coconut paste and fry for 2 minutes.
10. Now add the tomatoes , mix well and cook till they are soft. Add little water here if you want more gravy . Now add cooked chicken and mix all togeather well.
11. Allow to cook for 5 minutes approx. Remove from the heat and serve hot with hot dosa.

Note: Till 5th step you can cook chicken always and can refrigerate for later use. Or else can fry in little oil with desired pepper or chilli powder (chicken fry) and can have with sambar rice.

Labels: chicken, chicken curry, gudur chicken, masala chicken, spicy chicken

Posted by Meena Kandlakuti at 11:42 AM | Permalink | Comments

Hi Friends! Today Iam back with my native place special dish "Chicken Biryaani". This is very special to me, because my mom is expert in cooking this dish and enjoyed by all of our family members on some special occasions. As the dish is almost cooked, every body comes to know about that. How? "The Aroma by which whole house is filled". And now, as a saying in hindi "Petme choohe doudrahe hey!!" every body goes directly to the dinning table and eagerly awaits for my mom, that when she will be back from the kitchen with a dish full of biryaani:-) I learned this dish from my mother. Till now I cooked several times for my family members and friends. Once I mentioned in food meme, this is one of my favourite food among those five. Generally, this is served with perugu chutney (yogurt spicy dip) or with any chicken gravy or masala gravy wich is given with the parcel of biryaani at any restaurant in India or Hyderabad. So today I go with the step by step traditional preparation of Chicken Biryaani .

Ingredients For Marinating Chicken:
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Whole chicken 1 (skinned)
Pudina (Mint Leaves) bunch 1
Cilanto or Coriander bunch 1
Yogurt 1 cup (prefferabley 1 or 2 days set before yogurt) (can use low fat yogurt too)
Ginger-Garlic paste 2tbsp
Green chilli paste 2 to 3 0z (or make paste of 100gms of green chillies)
Elaichi or Cardamoms 20 no's (remove skin and make powder in a motar of 20 elaichi's)
Sajeera or Ajwain 1/2 tsp (they looks like cumin seeds but are little tiny and in double color which are not fennel seeds)
Lavanga or cloves(dried) 2
Bay leaf 2 (if small) or 1 (if big)
Cinnamon Sticks or Dalchini Patta 2 to 3
Salt a/c to taste (See the content and mix the salt. Just check with your finger tip dipped in marination and taste. Generally based on chicken and rice content)

Method For Marination:
--------------------------

1. Wash the chicken well several times, drain water competely.
2. Taken the chicken in a wide and deep pan (same pan in which you are planning to cook biryaani).
3. Cut cilantro and mint bunches into small pieces.
4. Mix with chicken. Also mix all above mentioned ingredients along with salt.
5. Mix well every thing with chicken and keep aside. Marinate for minimum 1/2 hr (if you have plenty of time and plan this dish in advance, then better to marinate for 45 minutes)

Ingredients For Rice preparation:
-----------------------------------
Basmati or long grain rice 5 or 6 cups (above chicken consistency is sufficient for 5 cups and 6 cups rice also)
Saffron strands(or kunkum puvvu or kesari) a pinch of
Big onions 2
A cup of whole milk (also can take reduced fat milk)
Oil for deep frying
2 tbsp of Ghee or clarified butter (optional)
2 small lemons
Water as required

Method For Rice Preparation:
-----------------------------------

Cook rice in 1: 1 1/2 ratio (i.e., for 1 cup of raw rice take one and half cup of water). Drain rice on a paper or in any mesh container. Soak saffron strands in cup of milk and keep it aside. Cut onions into very very thin and long pieces. Deep fry them in the oil batch by batch. (Becareful here, as you deep fry onions , oil suddenly raises up, then decrease the heat. That is why it suggested to deep fry them in smal batches , till they turn into golden brown in color. drain them on a paper towel and finally remove them in a plate. Take juice out of lemon's and keep it aside.

It is suggested to prepare rice and deep fry onions in advance or prepare them while chicken marinates. Because, rice should be dried completely before proceeding to the main dish preparation. But also remember, first prepare chicken marination and allow it to marinate while you prepare other things. So plan accordingly in advance. Pour very little amount of oil(same oil used to deep fry the onions) in the chicken marination to avoid it from burning. Now, after the rice is dried completely, place a layer of rice on the chicken(which is kept for marination). pour some saffron milk on the first layer rice. Spread some deep fried onions on it. Again, place a layer of rice followed by saffron milk and deep fried onions. Repeat this till all the rice is placed in layers. Here divide the oinions and saffron milk equally for all the layers of rice. Once all the layers are over, on the top layer make some small wholes with your two fingers (say about 5 to 6). In that wholes, pour some oil in which onions were deep fried. (Here you can also add ghee along with oil for more taste). Pour the lemon juice all over the rice from the top.

Now, the final step is very very important in the birayaani preparation. We need to cover the pan with a plate which is equal size of the pan with some heavy weight on it so that no air can go inside. In olden days, they used to cover the pan with a plate and used to cover the complete edge with the dough by twisting itall around with the help of little water. And finally used to put some heavy weight on it. Another method is, take a clean, washed long cloth. Wet the cloth, twist it completely and tie around the edge of the pan. But, I followed simple method here. I covered with a flat plate which is little bigger than the pan in reverse direction and kept a heavy weight (used a heavy weight stone). I made sure that no air goes into it. But always if possible follow the ancient method, if not follow my easy method:-) Am I Confusing u??? Anyways...cook this on medium heat about 20 minutes. never increase the heat or decrease. Finally you will start getting the aroma, once the dish comes to end of the preparation. Reduce the heat to low for 5 minutes and remove from the heat. Just before serving, mix whole thing well. To avoid any problems in mixing whole thing always preffer large, wide and deep container to cook. It should have enough space to mix the whole thing properly. Chicken Biryaani is ready:-)

Perugu Chutney Preparation:
---------------------------------
Take 2 cups of fresh yogurt. Add 1/4th cup of mint leaves diced very finely. Add 2 ro 3 green chillies cut into very very smal pieces. Finally add required salt and water according to your desired consistency of chutney or pachadi. (you can also add cucumber pieces (skinned) and onion cut into very very small pieces just before serving). Prepare this in advance before biryaani preparation starts. Serve chill perugu chutney with hot biryaani rice.

Biryaani can also be cooked with not only chicken but also with mutton and for vegetarians with different vegetables know as vegetable biryaani or some name it as vegetable pulav. Ofcourse pulav has it own preparation method again. Biryaani also taste best with any chicken gravy or if you want have simple then go with perugu chutney. So friends, go a head and plan this for your next party or for your dear family on weekend or any day. Make sure you have enough time for this. I enjoy this preparation too. And ofcourse the final step where I get my favourite aroma which pulls me, where ever Iam in the house towards the kitchen. So here I present a plate of chicken biryaani with perugu pachadi for you and only 'YOU' !!


Note: Click on the images to see a better picture and idea. To make this dish more rich, add boiled eggs cut into half from top of biryaani and cover the pan.To enjoy this more keep some cut lime pieces to squeeze in the rice and some roughly cut onion rings to chew them in between:-)

Labels: biryaani, chicken, chicken biryaani, perugu chutney, rice, yougurt

Posted by Meena Kandlakuti at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments

Chicken Curry is going to be my first Non-Vegeterian dish in my blog??..I never thought!! Really, I wanted to introduce Non-Veg items in my blog with Chicken Biryaani. Since we limited our selfs from eating Non-Veg, Iam getting chance to cook Non-Veg very rarely. But, from now onwards I will make sure to blog them when ever I cook at home. This curry actually I made for the small Barbeque type of get-to-geather in Srinivas's office. Then, very limited choice was given to me by him. That is, If I have to prepare Non-Veg then that should be less spicy yet very tasty:-)) Then I thought of making this dish. With no other delay and no more stories here I go with the recipe details.........

1. Cut chicken thighs into halfs or a/c to your choice size probably small pieces.(Here, we got chicken thighs since I was not decide any dish then, later I made two halfs from one thigh. You can also use boneless chicken, cubed and skinned for this recipe). Wash them mix in with curd (preferably one or two day before curd) and marinate for half-an-hour.
2. Make onions puree and keep aside.
3. Make tomato puree with cashews in it. i.e., grind both tamatoes and cashew togeather.
4. Heat oil in a wide , deep pan (for chicken to be cooked easily).
5. While chicken get marinated...prepare all other spices and purees as mentioned above.
6. Add caradamom pods (open the cover and add seeds along with it), cloves to bay leaf in the oil. Fry for 1 min.
7. Now add onion puree and fry till it starts changing color from white to light brown.
8. Add tomato and cashew puree along with salt, turmeric powder, chilli powder, coriander powder, garam masala. Mix well and cover the pan and allow to cook on medium heat for 2 to 3 minutes.
9. Now add marinated chicken and required water if necessary and mix well with all other ingredients.
10. Cover the pan and cook on low heat for half-an-hour or till the chicken is cooked well by stirring it ocassionaly. Here I mentioned half-an-hour time because chicken should be cooked well.
11. Once it is done you can garnish with fresh cilantro and very little lime juice if required. Since already curd is present more lime juice can change the taste of the curry.

Note: Cashews reduces the spice also makes the gravy light in color and gives little thickness to the gravy. I had to use them here for Srinivas's office staff memebers:-)) Other wise I generally avoid cashews in chicken or any other non-veg curry. We prefer non-veg items more spicy.

Labels: cashew, chicken, chicken curry, chicken in cashew nut sauce, curries, curry, kaaju, non vegetarian, non vegetarian dishes, nuts

Posted by Meena Kandlakuti at 11:56 AM | Permalink | Comments