Batman & Robin. Tom & Jerry. Biryani & Salan. Best duos of ALL time. Our good friends Mandar & Gauri had us over for biryani at their place last week & I decided to take a bucketful of Mirchi Ka Salan along. The biryani was absolutely epic & the Salan made for an excellent accompaniment. A highly analytical individual by nature, I take a mathematical approach to eating biryani – I eat 1/3rd by itself, 1/3rd with Raita & 2/3rd with Salan. Put your lousy calculators away. I never said the math was right. Here’s the #recipe:
- Assemble the following in a pan: 1/2 cup skinless peanuts, 2 tbsp sesame seeds, 2 tbsp desiccated coconut. Tell mean jokes about them & criticize everything they’ve ever done. Basically roast the hell out them for 10 min on medium heat.
- Cool & powder in a blender. Or make a paste with some water. Either works.
- Heat 3 tbsp oil & throw in a handful of curry leaves followed by 1 tsp each of cumin, mustard & nigella seeds
- Add 2 tsp Ginger & Garlic paste + a splash of water & cook on high heat.
- Add peanut-sesame-coconut blend & mix
- Add a spot of water & continue to cook on high heat
- Add 1 tsp each of turmeric, red chilli & cumin powder
- Cook mixture well till oil releases & the thing starts looking shiny. Shouldn’t take too long because you’ve already roasted most of the stuff in step 1.
- Add 1 tsp of tamarind paste & mix well. I used this killer khatta that @paromenon brought back from The Philippines but any tamarind will do.
- Add 1/2 a cup of water & tip in two quartered tomatoes & about 10-12 Salan Mirchis (Jalapeno peppers) with a slit down the side. The slit is important because the salan needs to infiltrate the mirchi & cook it from the inside.
- Reduce heat & simmer for 15 min with a lid on. Cook longer if the chillies still feel tough.
- Rest for 1 hr & serve with biryani. Or chapatis. Or drizzle over Vanilla ice cream. Do whatever, guys. Who am I to tell you what to do?
