Chicken machboos is the bahraini rice dish which is similar to biriyani, with varying cooking methods, ingredients. Basically its a rice dish with chicken. Here in this recipe I have used baharat mix, freshly grounded, which gives the unique taste to this dish.
Preparation time : 30 minutes
Cooking time : 30 minutes
Serves : 6
Ingredients :
Basmati rice – 2 .5 cups
Chicken – 1 kg, big pieces
Ghee/butter – 3 tablespoons
Bay leaf – 1
Cinnamon stick – 1, about 2 inch long
Cloves – 5
Cardamom – 5
Onion – 2, large, finely chopped
Ginger garlic paste – 2 teaspoons
Turmeric powder – 1/4 teaspoon
Green chilly – 2
Tomato – 2 , large, finely chopped
Coriander leaves – few, finely chopped
Parsley – few, finely chopped
Salt – as per taste
Dried lime – 4 , make holes all around on it
Baharat mix :
Black peppercorn – 1 teaspoon
Cumin seeds – 1 teaspoon
Coriander seeds – 2 teaspoons
Cinnamon stick – 1 inch long
Cloves- 3
Cardamom – 3
Ground nutmeg – 1/4 th teaspoon
Kashmiri red chilly powder – 1 tablespoon
Method :
Wash and soak the basmati rice for 30 minutes.
Meanwhile, prepare the baharat mix. Dry roast all the ingredients mentioned under baharat mix , except ground nutmeg and chilly powder. Roast them well till nice aroma comes. Grind it into fine powder along with ground nutmeg and red chilly powder. Baharat mix is ready.
Wash and clean the chicken pieces. Marinate it with half of the baharat mix, salt and keep aside for 10 minutes.
To prepare machboos, take a wide pot . Heat 1 tablespoon of oil and fry the chicken on medium heat, till nice red-brown color on each side, around 5 minutes on each side. Remove it from the pot and keep aside.
In the same pot , heat ghee, add cinnamon stick, bay leaf, cloves, cardamom and saute for few seconds. Then add onions, saute till golden brown. then add ginger garlic paste. Saute for 2 minutes. Then add remaining baharat mix, turmeric powder and saute for 2 minutes. Then add green chilly, tomatoes, dried lime and saute well till tomatoes turn soft. Then add chopped coriander leaves and parsley.
Then add the half fried chicken and 4.5 cups of water, salt. Let the water comes to boil. Then add the drained rice. Stir gently once. Cover the lid and cook on medium heat till rice is cooked. Approximately it takes 10 -15 minutes.
Serve the machboos with salad and yoghurt 🙂
Note :
To get better taste, you can add chicken stock while cooking rice.
Try our other Rice Dishes too and let us know your feedback.