Topic: Akhni/Yakhni

[George]

This one, George, dated March 2020 ...

You are in luck. I kept the text from 2020 with related posts in other years and called it "Pilau rice by Microwave - Phil".

Once I started making pulao rice using a microwave oven, I never looked back, and my pulao is in most respects as good as I have eaten.  But when Ganesha opened in Bodmin, and I compared their pulao rice with mine, I was sure that theirs was better and I began to wonder why ...  I finally reached the conclusion that while the taste and appearance of mine was as good as Ganesha's, theirs was better in terms of aroma — when you lift the lid of one of their takeaway containers, the fragrance of the cooked rice is out of this world.  So this evening I tried to replicate theirs in terms of aroma as well as taste and appearance, and I do believe I had some success.

What I did on this occasion (and what I have never done previously) is to prepare what I will call the rice "gravy" in advance of cooking the rice.  Normally I heat some ghee in a Pyrex casserole dish in the microwave oven, add the whole spices,  put the casserole dish back and cook for a further five minutes, add the rice, cook for further two minutes, add the water and then cook for 12 minutes at full power and 20 minutes at 10%.  On this occasion I bhooned the spices in a little oil in a saucepan, then added what I estimated to be sufficient boiling water and cooked on a low heat for half an hour or so.  I then cooked the rice as above, strained the water onto the rice, picked out the cardomom and garlic flakes from the sieve with chopsticks, added them to the rice, gave it all a good stir and then cooked as before.  The results were excellent — when I lifted the lid off the Pyrex casserole, I was greeted with a wonderful smell of aromatic rice.  Not exactly the same smell as Ganesha's, I have to say — clearly some more analytical work on their rice spicing required — but an order of magnitude more aromatic than before.  If, like me, you like aromatic rice, do give it a try.

** Phil.                                           
« Last Edit: 30 March 2020 at 09:39 AM by Peripatetic Phil »

Jan 03, 2012
Although in 2011 I experimented with the "don't wash, and dry-fry" approach to pulao rice, and was quite happy with the results, I did come to realise that while the technique most definitely works and produces very acceptable pulao rice, the one thing that suffers in the process is the colour : the rice just isn't white at the end of the exercise.  With this in mind, I have started 2012 by returning to the "Wash, soak and drain" method, but have modified my subsequent technique to use no stove-top utensils at all : all takes place in the microwave oven.  So here is a step-by-step guide to what I am now happy to call "perfect pulao" : it really does lead to perfection, and I don't think can be significantly improved much further.

Step 1: place one mug of rice in a very large kitchen sieve, and stand the latter in an even larger bowl so that the sieve hangs down into the bowl for the former's full depth.  Stand under the kitchen tap in the sink, and wash thoroughly, using hot water at first and then switching to cold.  Leave the water running while you do other things, and return from time to time to give the contents of the sieve a good stir.  When stirring no longer produces any signs of cloudiness in the water, turn off the tap and leave to soak for about 30 minutes, then empty the bowl and allow the rice to drain/dry.

Step 2 : into the base of a Pyrex [R] casserole with lid, put a little ghee (maybe 1/3 of an ice-cream scoop, no more) and on top of the ghee
add your pulao spices : faux cinnamon, Indian bay, kala jeera, cardamom, fennel,  a couple of cloves, and -- most important of all -- some star anise.  Place in an 850W microwave oven and cook on full power with the lid on for five minutes.  Remove from the oven, add some freeze-dried garlic flakes and the drained rice, salt to taste, and then cover with boiling water to a depth of about 1/3". 

Place in an 850W microwave oven with the lid on for 12 minutes.  Remove from the microwave oven, lift over gently, add a few drops of food colouring if desired (keep each colour separate) and either return to the microwave oven at 10% for about 20 minutes, or place in a warm (80C) conventional oven for about the same period, in both cases still with the lid firmly in place.  Gently lift over once more and serve.  The pulao is even better on the second day, when the rice has been in contact with the spices and garlic for a full 24 hours, but is edible and delicious when freshly prepared.

There are no particular quantities of spices; I simply shake them into the palm of my hand and add them when it looks as if I have the right amount.  Probably two star anise, two or three Indian bay leaves, at most two cloves, 8 to 10 little-finger-nail size pieces of faux cinnamon,  8 to 10 green cardamom, 2/3 teaspoon kala jeera, 1/3 teaspoon fennel and maybe 1 1/2 teaspoons freeze-dried garlic flakes.  But I really must emphasise that all of these are guesses -- I have never measured how much I use, and just use visual judgement to guide me.

Don't forget to let the rice rest for 20 minutes, either at 10% power or in a conventional oven at 80oC : this will both help to dry it and also to set the colour if you are using liquid colouring.

The weight of the Pyrex lid prevents too much steam escaping, but it is by no means a hermetic seal!

One preferred mug of rice weighs 8 7/8 oz

Torn Indian bay goes into the ghee and is fried for five minutes along with the rest of the pulao spices.

2013
I see that the initial post in this thread doesn't accurately describe my current methodology, so I will document the differences here :

1) Pre-heat the ghee for five minutes
2) Add the whole spices, coat in the now-liquid ghee, and cook for five minutes
3) Add the drained rice, mix gently with the spices and ghee, then cook for two minutes
4) Add the boiling water, salt, freeze-dried garlic flakes, stir gently, then cook for 12 minutes as before.

No other changes that I can spot.  The spices will tolerate longer than five minutes without burning if you want to experiment.  Don't forget to tear the Indian bay leaves into shreds, and you can crack the cardamom pods if you want to.  No more than two cloves, and they can safely be omitted if you don't like the flavour they impart.

"Preheat ghee" : all use of the microwave oven is at full power apart from the final resting phase.

My microwave is 850W, and in my experience both the ghee and the ghee + spices can tolerate well over five minutes without harm (this is, of course, fully-leaded butter ghee, not your watered-down namby-pamby vegetable rubbish !).  The rice, on the other hand, is another matter, and I might be inclined to recommend cutting back the two minutes to 1 minute 30 or so ...

[Peripatetic Phil]

Many thanks, George — I am much obliged to you.  Original thread contents re-instated (at-end).
--
** Phil.