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I was asked for a recipe, and since I typed this up, I thought I'd share.

I don't use a recipe, although occasionally I will read a bunch of recipes at once to get inspiration for modifications to my basic biryani. The way my family taught me to make biryani you need three basic ingredients: rice, meat, and flavors.

Rice for my family is always basmati rice. Short grain rice is right out. In a proper biryani or pilau you want light fluffy rice with each grain separate from the next. It is impossible to get this effect with Uncle Ben's boil in bag, or Japanese rice, or arborio, or Korean, or any of the other million varieties of rice you can find in your local yuppy grocery store. If you can't find basmati, Thai jasmine rice will do in a pinch, but it is not a light and has a slightly different aroma. I have heard tell from middle eastern friends of mine that there are some Persian varieties of rice that are far superior to basmati but I have never been able to locate any to do a side by side comparison and I am also biased in favor of basmati since that is what I grew up eating on all special occasions.

I almost always use lamb for biryani because I love lamb, however, beef, chicken, or goat would work just as well. You can also make a vegetarian biryani by making potatoes and vegetables instead of meat, but I don't actually know how to cook potatoes.

For the flavor base I always start out by frying a couple of onions sliced into thin half moons. I heat fat (oil or butter, depending on your taste) until it is as hot as I can safely heat it, toss in the onions (stand back because they will splatter) and then turn the heat down to low or medium-low and let them cook slowly for about 20-30 minutes or so until they are nice and brown. Then I turn the heat up to medium or medium high and toss in any other aromatics I am using, often garlic and ginger, along with any whole spices I am using, usually cumin seed, and fry for about thirty seconds. Then I throw in all the powdered spices and fry them for another thirty seconds or so.

Next the meat goes in. Ideally the meat will have been marinating in yogurt and more spices overnight. I push all the onions and things to the side and let the meat get seared on all sides. If necessary I turn the heat up in order to brown the meat. Once it is brown all over I add enough water to cover the meat with an inch of water, turn the heat to low, and let it simmer. It needs to simmer long enough for the meat to be tender, at least ninety minutes for lamb or beef. I check on it every so often to make sure the water hasn't all boiled off. Here you can add other ingredients like carrots, potatoes, whole cinnamon sticks, bay leaves, crushed cardamom pods, fruit.

While the meat cooks, I prepare and boil the rice. The rice needs to be rinsed quite a bit, even if you are buying all organic pesticide-free hydroponic local vegan free range rice because rice is starchy and there are always little bits of rice starch powder in any bag of rice. The starch ruins the texture of the cooked rice and makes it gummy. Wash it by pouring it in a big bowl, and covering it with an inch of cold water. Swish it gently and watch the water get cloudy, then pour off the cloudy water. Repeat until the water becomes dramatically less cloudy - at least three times - before putting the rice in the pot to boil with fresh cold water. I've never measured how much water I use -- it needs to be enough that the rice can't absorb all of it and start to steam cook. I let the rice boil until it is al dente -- about 5 minutes. Then I take the rice off the heat and drain it - gently gently gently - in a sieve.

Once the meat is done simmering, layer about half the rice in a casserole dish. Layer the meat on top of this, and then finish with a layer of rice. If you like you can divide the rice and meat into more than three layers, but once people start serving out of the bowl no one can tell how many layers there were anyway so I think it's not worth the effort. If you like you can add garnishes to the top. I like to sprinkle saffron water (water or milk in which a few thread of saffron have been crumbled and soaked for at least thirty minutes) on top. It's also common to use slivered almonds or pistachios, or edible gold or silver leaf, or sprinkles of dark red food coloring. Seal the casserole dish tightly either with a good tight lid or aluminum foil and toss in a 300F oven to finish cooking the rice in the steam from the curry gravy.

The curry I made tonight used the following spices:
Fresh grated ginger
Salt
Red chili powder
Whole cumin seeds
Ground cumin
Ground coriander seeds
Garam masala (a blend of sweet spices like clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, mace, etc. It varies according to what brand you buy)
Green cardamom pods

I also stirred some chopped dried apricots and sultanas in with the meat.