Ingredients

1. Mutton/Lamb (with bones) – 750 gms

For marinade

2. Ginger and garlic paste – 3 tbsp
3. Curd – 1 1/3 cup
4. Chilli powder – 2 tsp
5. Turmeric powder – 1 tsp

Whole spices:

6. Black cumin seeds – 1/2 tsp
7. Dagad phool (black stone flower) – 1 tbsp
8. Cloves - 5
9. cinnamon sticks (1 inch size) - 4/li>
10. Cassia buds - 10
11. Staranise - 3
12. Black cardamom - 2,
13. green cardamom - 5
14. Mace and nutmeg powder – 1/4 tsp
15. Biryani masala – 1 tsp
16. Green chillies (chopped or sliced) – 5
17. Mint( chopped) –20 gms
18. Coriander leaves(chopped) – 20 gms
19. Tomatoes (optional, chopped)– 1
20. Salt – as required
21. Oil – 2 tbsp

For frying onions

22. Oil or ghee - 3/4 cup
23. Bay leaves - 2 to 3
24. Onion(sliced) – 5 or 500 gms

For cooking rice

25. Basmati Rice- 500 gms
26. Caraway seeds – 1/2 tsp
27. Water – 2 litres or as required
28. Salt - as required

For garnishing/layering (dum)

29. Saffron (Kesar) and lime (yellow) colour – a pinch
30. Mint – few
31. Coriander leaves – few
32. Biryani masala – 1 tsp
33. Lemon juice – 4 tbsp
34. Fried onions- few
35. Ghee (clarified butter) – 3 tbsp

Method

1. Chop mint and coriander leaves. Keep about a quarter of it for garnishing while giving dum.

Marination

2. First put all the ingredients in a big vessel or any bowl, add all the marination ingredients and mix well.
3. Add mutton pieces and mix well.
4. Keep the marinated mutton for 4 hrs or overnight in the fridge.
5. If you want, you can add the fried onions and mix during marination. I have not added fried onions to the marinade as I did not fry the onions in advance.
6. The pieces of mutton should be of medium size and not very big.

Preparing gravy

7. Take a big utensil and add oil. When it gets hot add bay leaves and stir it. Then add onions and fry until it is soft and brown. It will take about 15-20 mins. You can close the lid and cook. When it is cooked take 1/4 cup of fried onions and keep it aside for use while layering the rice.
8. Simmer and then add the marinated mutton with the marinade. Mix well with the onions.

Cooking rice

9. Soak the rice in water for about 1/2 hr.
10. When the water starts to boil, add rice and salt. Boil for about 5 to 6 mins only. The rice has to be cooked roughly about 50%. Rinse under cold tap water to stop further cooking.
11. While boiling, do not stir very often as the grains may break. The grains will be longer after cooking, but still raw.

Layering (mixing gravy and rice)

12. When steam starts to come from the mutton (mutton is heated up nicely), add the rice, which is half cooked. Spread evenly on the heated marinated mutton.
13. Sprinkle colour on the rice. Add biryani masala, fried onions, mint, coriander leaves and lemon juice. If you want, you can also add a few drops of ghee on rice, evenly.

Dum process

14. After the layering is done, keep the flame to high for about 5 mins until you see some steam coming from the corners below the rice.
15. Now immediately put the flame to simmer and then cover the biryani vessel with aluminium foil and close the lid tightly.
16. After closing the lid, put the flame to high and cook for about 5 mins. Then lower the flame and cook the biryani for about 20-25 mins or until the rice and meat are cooked.
17. The sign of whether the biryani is cooked and ready is when you can smell its aroma from the nearby rooms.
18. Switch off and let it rest for 15 mins. Do not open the lid immediately because the steam inside the vessel will continue to cook the biryani.
19. When the biryani is cooked, you need to be careful while serving. Take the biryani out with a wide spoon or a saucer slowly from one side to prevent the rice grains from breaking.
20. Serve it with raitha or mirchi ka saalan (chilli curry) or brinjal curry (chutney) or with chicken 65 as a side dish.

Notes

1. You can reduce the chillies if you do not eat spicy food or if your chillies are very hot.
2. Rice should be only 50% cooked. While cooking the rice you can add a few drops of oil or vinegar and while draining wash it under cold water. This will keep the rice grains all nice and separated.
3. Rice has to be cooked in advance and kept aside, readily available for layering.
4. You can buy ready made biryani masala. If you want to make it yourself, refer to my biryani masala recipe.
5. Add salt carefully for the marinade and rice. Divide the salt quantity to portions and add as it will be easier this way and will not risk adding more salt.
6. I grind my ginger and garlic with whole spices to make my ginger and garlic paste. Refer to my ginger and garlic paste recipe.
7. Mix colour with 2 tbsp of water or milk and then add to the rice. Alternatively, you can even just sprinkle the colour on the biryani. You can also use saffron instead of the colour.
8. While giving dum you can keep a flat tawa beneath the vessel or even better if the utensil has a thick bottom. This will prevent the biryani from sticking to the bottom of the utensil. I have used a non stick vessel, so I did not use a tawa while giving dum.
9. I have added tomatoes to this mutton dum biryani, but you can avoid if you do not want to add.
10. For making any biryani, you can maintain from 2:1 to 1:1 mutton to rice ratio. For example, you can use 500 gms to 1 kg of mutton for 500 gms of rice. Obviously, you need to adjust the spices appropriately.
11. I have cooked my biryani in oil and only drizzled a little ghee on top of the rice while layering. You can choose the proportion of oil and ghee and also how much according to your liking.
12. Shahjeera is also known as black cumin seeds (kala jeera). If black cumin seeds are not available, you can use caraway seeds. The caraway seeds also belong to the cumin family. Shahjeera is darker in colour and thin. Some also say both are same.
13. While layering you can also mix the layering ingredients with the half cooked rice. Mix it partly so that some white rice is still seen. Add this rice to the gravy and spread evenly in the vessel you want to use to give dum.
14. Biryani vessel can be sealed with the lid by using a wheat dough and then dum can be given on a low flame.