Is it biryani?

Everyone loves biryani, Hyderabadi kacche gosht ki biryani that is. The meat that falls off the bone, the long grained rice that doesn't stick to fingers, the fragrance of spices that can make stomachs rumble with hunger and anticipation and the Irani restaurants where it is cooked by the tonnes.

But is it biryani as it was created in biryans over campfires for armies on the march? Is it the same dish that the men created where they dunked everything in sight to create the one dish to fill all the tummies? Is it the same dish, the royal women, including Emperor Jehangir's wife, modified to create the multi-layered gastronomic extravaganza? Step into some of the busiest biryani joints and get an eyeful of the fragrant rice with a piece of meat or bone sticking out. Roll up your sleeves and dig into it with your bare hands - the way it is to be eaten.

A chat with some of the cooks and waiters at the favourite biryani joints reveals the good, bad and ugghh side of biryani. At most of the restaurants, the quantum of gravy that sticks to the meat and the food varies depending on the time of the day, says a gourmand who thinks lunch is the best time to get the real flavour of biryani. Only if it is dum will the fat rise to the top and leave the rice soft with all the flavours of spices and meat.

Currently there are three variations of cooking in Hyderabadi restaurants, only one of them is authentic dum. The first is a one-well-heeled eatery that sells thousands of plates of biryani in Secunderabad. What they do is cook the meat and spices in one huge cauldron with little rice. The rice is cooked separately. Step in and order, and you will get your mountain of rice with the meat buried in it. Part of the rice would be dry while a little of it will be sticky.

The second is a real travesty; the meat and the rice are cooked separately, then mixed before serving. Then there are a few biryani joints that do cook in dum but fiddle with the proportions of meat and rice where the proportion of meat is reduced and the quantum of rice increased.

An art

"Not just the cooking even serving the biryani with the right amount of meat and with the layers of rice intact is an art. That art is also dying," says Md Yousuf who works in an old city biryani eatery and claims he can serve 30 biryanis in as half as many minutes. You may get a taste of real good biryani only if you are lucky.

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Amidst all the informationis a nugget of dope

Birian the Persian word that means roasted or grilled gives the name and changes the cooking process from pilaf or pulau. If Timurlaine's army is credited with creating a rough version of it, it was in Akbar's kitchen that it was perfected where the Persian technique of marinating meat in curd was modified with the addition of ground spices, onions, garlic and almond to the marination mix. Even Aurangzeb, the austere Mughal who banished music, booze, dance and art from the palaces of Delhi liked what he called khichri-biryani. It was he and his governor of Deccan the Nizam who brought the mughlai dish to Hyderabad.

SERISH NANISETTI

Monday, Dec 18, 2006, Metroplus