Eid mubarak!! Eid is not complete without Gosht Biryani and Sheer Khurma. My biryani is in the oven for the final round of preparation – dum. That means steaming the rice layered with curry so that the flavors mingle. I take the easy route and use the Shan Spice Mix for biryani. Its nothing like my Dadi’s Sindhi Biryani but I haven’t been able to track down that recipe yet.

Ingredients:

Beef – One pound

Potatoes eight quarters

Fried onions – 1 1/2 cups (can get these at any indian store)

Diced Tomatoes – 1 32 ounce can

Whole milk yogurt – 1/2 cup

Garlic – 3 cloves finely chopped

Ginger 1 inch finely chopped

Coconut Oil – 1/4 cup

Long grain white basmati rice – 3 cups

Shan Sindhi Biryani Spice Mix

Method:

Heat 1/8 cup oil in a heavy bottomed pan. Using a heavy bottomed pan is essential, otherwise all the spices with stick to the bottom and burn. Once heated, fry the Shan Sindhi Biryani Spice mix till fragrant. Add the fried onions and continue stirring for 3 minutes. Add the ginger and garlic. Bhuno the mixture on medium heat for 5 minutes with the remaining oil. Bhuno means to stir and cook on a medium – high heat. This step will intensify the color of the curry, giving it a rich reddish brown color. It will also incorporate the spices into the onions and garlic, melding the flavors together. Its important to keep stirring since you don’t want your spices to burn.

Once its a rich brown color add the diced tomatoes and cook for another 1 – 2 minutes. Now add the yogurt and mix into the curry so there are no more specks of white left. Lower the heat to low medium and add the meat and potatoes. Cover and cook for 5-10 minutes. Every 10 minutes for an hour, give the curry a quick stir to avoid the masala sticking to the bottom. If your masala is sticking to the bottom, add 1.5 cups of water and continue cooking. Chicken cooks faster than Beef, so I don’t have to much water to that.

The curry should reduce down to a rich brown curry. The onions should have melted and the oil risen to the top. The curry is ready now. I usually take one cup of curry and some meat and potatoes aside in a small bowl for the family. They snack on this while the biryani cooks. The amount of curry is a bit much for the biryani, so save a bowl of curry for a later meal.

I cook my rice in the microwave. Add 3 cups of rice in a large microwavable bowl and wash the rice once to get rid of the starch. Fill once again with water till the water covers the rice one inch. To semi cook the rice, as for biryani, cook for 8 minutes. Drain the water and add the rice on top of your curry. Sprinkle some coriander and fried onions on the top of the rice. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes (This is the dum stage).