Chicken Pulao

Chicken Pulao is a delicious and easy to make recipe. Yogurt marinated chicken is cooked with spices, blended well with rice and simmered to perfection. The end result is sumptuous Chicken Pulao. After all the try outs, I finally came with the right fusion of this recipe. In my version of Chicken Pulao, I made this as simple as possible but there is no compromise in taste. When you are tempting for Chicken Biryani and don't have time and all the fancy ingredients to make, try this instead. And you will be surprised with the amazing flavor, which does not taste less than a chicken Biryani, So enough talking and let's start cooking with "Flavors of Sneha's Kitchen".

Chciken Pulao

Ingredients

500 gms chicken pieces (Washed and pat dried)
1 1/2 cup of basmati rice (Soaked in water for 30 mnts and then strained)
1/2 cup of yogurt
2 onions thinly sliced
1 1/2 tbsp of ginger-garlic paste
3-4 green chilli
2 tsp of coriander powder
1 tsp of garam masala
1/2 tsp of turmeric powder
1 tsp of red chilli powder
1 tsp of cumin seeds
1" of cinnamon stick
3-4 cardamom
3-4 peppercorns
3-4 cloves
1 bay leave
7-8 mint leaves
1 tbsp of coriander leaves
1 tbsp of clarified butter/desi ghee
2 tbsp of vegetable oil
Salt to taste
3 cups of water



Method:

Marinate chicken in yogurt, ginger-garlic paste, turmeric powder, red chilli powder and garam masala powder. Mix well, cover and keep it in refrigerator for 30 mnts.

Heat oil in a pan. Add in the cumin seeds, bay leaves, whole spices and let it crackle.

Add the sliced onion and salt. Saute until onion get golden brown color.

Now add the marinated chicken and broken green chilli. Mix well and cook. Since the chicken has been marinated in yogurt, it will loose out some water. Keep it in high flame and let the water gets evaporated. Keep stirring in between to avoid sticking this into the pan.

Once all the excess water gets evaporated, add the coriander powder. Mix well and cook.

Saute the chicken on medium flame until all the spices and chicken are cooked perfectly.

In another pan, heat the clarified butter. Add soaked rice and saute on medium flame for 1-2 minutes.

Now add the cooked chicken and combine well with rice.

Now add water and mix well. Throw in the mint leaves and coriander leaves. Adjust the amount of salt and mix well.

Once water comes to a boil, cover and cook it on low flame until rice is done. This process should take approx 15-18 mnts. Turn off heat and do not remove the lid for 10 mnts. Make sure rice does not get burn at the bottom.

And Voila! your sumptuous Chicken Pulao is all ready. Serve with sliced onion and raita or your choice of curry.

Chicken Pulao ready to be served

Tips: To get a perfect texture, make sure you add just the double amount of water than rice. Soaking the rice before cooking is also very important. To make your chicken pulao more aromatic, you may also use some saffron. Just mix the saffron strands in 1 tsp of cold milk and mix this in pulao while cooking. You may also sprinkle some deep fried onions at the end. Choice is all yours :)

Recipe Courtesy: My super awesome Bhabhs "Anusha Jaiswal"