Airline Pulao

There was a time, when the kids were very young, that occasional meals were built around a rice dish (a pulao or a khichadi). Along with a yogurt-based salad, roasted papad, some steamed carrots & broccoli we had ourselves a meal.
It was one such evening and I was winging a pulao, literally throwing in things that caught my fancy. One of the things I added was a hefty pinch of cardamom and liberal amounts of kasoori methi.

My son had a spoonful of the pulao and exclaimed loudly 'Aai, this is just like the S- Airlines pulao.' He was too young to know that this was not exactly an compliment.

Since then this pulao has been made many times. Somewhere along the line I added in some paneer cubes and, thankfully, the name changed to paneer pulao. Sometimes my nieces refer to this as that pulao.

We don't eat much rice nowadays; a couple of times a week. And when we do have some, the quantities have gone down as has the size of the paneer cubes. A bit of paneer does go a long way. I've made this pulao with white, red, and brown rice. When using brown or red rice the quantity of spices and the onion and garlic definitely need to be increased to stand up to the robustness of the rice.

Ingredients
The quantities are mere guidelines.
1 cup rice, wash and set aside
½ medium onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
½ tsp jeera
1 tsp kasuri methi
½ tsp powdered cardamom
7-8 cashews, roughly chopped
1 cup paneer cubes
salt, to taste
1 tbsp oil
2 cups warm water

Method Over medium heat, warm the oil.
Add the onions and let then brown.
Add the garlic and cook a bit but don't let the garlic brown.
Add the kasoori methi, jeera, cardamom, and the chili powder cook for another ½ minute.
Add the rice and saute for a bit (less than a minute) before adding two cups warm water.
When the rice is half cooked, add the salt and the paneer cubes. Give it a good stir.
Cover and cook thru.
Once cooked, fluff the pulao slightly using a fork before serving.
(Do not overcook the rice.)
Enjoy!


If you have any questions or comments, please write to me the.best.cooker@gmail.com.Thanks for stopping by.

Economy of Instructions & Ingredients

Browse through the food and drink section of any book store in India and you'll come across stacks of cook booklets. These booklets cover a mind boggling range: Microwave Party Cooking, No Sugar/Oil/Salt recipes, Fast foods (that is, food that is allowed when observing a religious fast!), Blood Pressure Cooking (?) etc.
Most of these booklets are the size of a largish postcard and have one recipe per page. While one can't take short cuts when listing ingredients, brevity comes in when providing cooking instructions.
Take this one for example:
Grind the first 5 ingredients to make a paste. Prepare the tempering and pour over the paste. Cook the rice. Create layers of the rice and the paste. Serve hot.

Clearly these recipes are not for the novice cook as they seem to assume that the reader has some basic knowledge of cooking.
Come to think of it, these recipes are absolutely tweet-ready.

Ask my Aai for a recipe and you get a list of ingredients. She (correctly) assumes that I have the smarts to estimate the quantity of said ingredients. Since I have watched her cook for years she also assumes that I have learned something by osmosis. Correct, once again!

After sampling some of the late-summer sweet corn, she suggested we make corn pulao by 'adding corn to our usual party pulao'. Economy of instructions!

Do not let the pale appearance fool you. This flavourful pulao is fantastic on its own but is a simple and uncomplicated part of any party menu where everything else is vying for ones attention.

Corn Pulao
Ingredients
1 cup rice, wash and set aside
1 cup fresh corn kernels
5 cloves
2 leaves tamaalpatra (tej patta)
1 inch piece of cinnamon
1 tbsp oil
salt, to taste
2 cups (or more) hot water

Method
Heat the oil and when hot add the spices.
Saute till they start to darken (about a minute).
Add the rice and corn and saute for another minute.
Stir in the water and cook uncovered still most of the water is absorbed.
Add the salt and give it a good stir.
Put the lid on and cover till the rice cooks through.
Enjoy!

Five ingredients, not counting salt and oil. Economy of ingredients!
The pulao is making it way to Anita's party.

Quinoa-Carrot Pulao

If it doesn't contain any rice is it still a pulao?
This is a riff on the classic carrot-pulao.
I go thru these phases where I make an extra effort to eat less rice.

During one such phase, when a friend mentioned how she has virtually given up rice and instead eats quinoa I was all ears.
Even before we could complete our conversation, in my mind the carrot-pulao had morphed into a quinoa-carrot!

This is an incredibly aromatic pulao and no, we didn't miss the rice one bit.
Equally delicious when hot or at room temperature. I'll be making this pulao quite often. The next time I do, I'll swap out the blurred photo.

Quinoa-Carrot Pulao
Ingredients
4 cups cooked quinoa
2 medium sized carrots, grated or chopped
4-5 black peppercorns
3 cloves (lavang)
½ inch cinnamon stick
1 tsp fennel (bishops weed)
2 pods cardamom
1 green chilies, chopped
1 tbsp oil
salt, to taste
4-5 stalks cilantro, chopped

Method
Heat the oil. When hot, add the green chillies.
Next add all the spices and saute for about a minute.
Add the carrots and let them cook for another minute.
Add the quinoa and salt. Mix well.
Cover and cook over low heat for 3-4 minutes.
Adjust the salt and garnish with cilantro.
Enjoy this protein rich pulao on its own or with a simple raita.

My entry to JFI:Carrots.

Radish & Red Rice Pulao

The front of the packet said 'Red Rice from Sri Lanka', the flip side had a huge label 'Brown Rice'. This I had to try!
Not having any experience cooking red rice, I treated it as I could brown rice.

The addition of red radish made it a legit 'R' dish for Nupur's blog event.

Don't let the blah appearance fool you, the pulao was quite tasty. The radishes added a nice crunch. The nuttiness and the texture is like brown rice. The benefits of using such an hulled rice are well know. More about that here.

Radish & Red Rice Pulao

Ingredients
2 cups red rice, washed and soaked in warm water for 30-45 minutes
4-5 red radishes (halved and sliced into crescents)
2 tbsp tomato paste, thinned with a bit of water
3 tsp oil
1 tsp garam masala (or your choice of masala)
salt, to taste
4-5 stalks of cilantro, chopped
4+ cups water, warm

Method
Heat a tsp of oil in a kadai (wok), when hot add the radish.
Cook the radishes slightly. With a slotted spoon transfer the radishes to plate/ dish.
Add the rest of the oil to the kadai.
Drain the rice and add to the oil along with the masala and tomato paste. Saute a bit.
Add the water and mix well.
Cook covered for 6-7 minutes.
Add the radishes and salt. Continue cooking for another 5-6 minutes.
Do a taste and texture test. The rice should be slightly chewy (it will never seem fully cooked the way white rice does).
Add more water or salt, as required.
Garnish with cilantro.
Enjoy!

Serving Suggestions
We enjoyed our pulao with a raita.
But since the pulao tastes good even at room temperature, it would make a nice appetiser if you serve small balls of the pulao in lettuce cups like this:

Variations
Instead of tomato paste, you can use lemon juice. The redness of the pulao will be slightly reduced.
Any vegetable can be substituted for the radish.
Add some beans and you have a one dish meal.

This is my entry for Nupur's A-Z of Indian Vegetables series.