Eid joy means sitting down with the family to enjoy favourite food, and mutton biryani on the festive table adds extra flavour. Instead of ordering out, make a fragrant, succulent mutton biryani at home this Eid in a simple way, and surprise the family with your own festive cooking. Here is the recipe.

First mix the mutton with yoghurt, ginger-garlic paste, chilli powder, turmeric, garam masala and salt to taste, then cover and set aside. Marinating overnight gives a deeper flavour, but if time is short, at least an hour will do. Then heat oil or ghee in a large pan and fry all the whole spices until fragrant. Add chopped onion and stir; when it turns light brown, add the marinated mutton. Stir for 5 minutes over medium to slightly high heat until the meat changes colour. Then add tomato, cook it down well and let the mutton become tender.

Meanwhile, prepare the semai in a separate pan. When the ghee or oil is hot, fry the semai until light brown, then add water as needed and boil it. Once cooked, drain off the excess water and set aside.

When the mutton and semai are ready, start layering the biryani in a large pot. First spread half the semai and top it with half the cooked mutton. Sprinkle over mint leaves, coriander leaves, fried cashews and raisins. Make a second layer the same way with the remaining semai and mutton. Finally, drizzle saffron-infused milk over the top layer, cover and leave on dum for a while, and the fragrant mutton biryani is ready to serve.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.