PILLAUS

PILLAUS How to Prepare -Make -Cook ?

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PILLAUS Recipe

From the simplest of made-up pilgrim dishes of rice, we ascend now to the apex of the aristocratic pillauy, sometimes spely pilaf. I have spelt it as we pronounce it in India. This dish is said to have come with the conquerors of the North, and like the French names which persist on the simplest of British menus, the name pillau will appear today in many guises all over the sub-continent.

In an unpretentious-looking little restaurant off Piccadilly (that haven of the homesick hungry of all nations) we were once served with a real pillau which might easily have been cooked in Delhi, and served with all its conventionally correct adjuncts including even the dahi bridesmaids.

Among these was also a special one which I could have sowrn to be a genuine South Indian dahi-vada. When the sweets came, there was a til khadi (not to be confused with the mixer curry kadi), exactly like the ones I may eat in my own home in the far South. Only when the coffee appeared did our kind host, who was himself a Persian, tell us, that was the best Turkish food you could get in all London! Looking around, one could see the tables crowded with an obvious mixture of many nationalities, all happily enjoying menus which, no doubt, were new to at least some of them.

In all pillau making, the chief thin to remember is the quality of the rice and the quantity as well of the ghee or fat. The expert recommends bulk for bulk rice and ghee. I think for meat pillaus you really can manage quite well with a little less fat than that proportion. The Turkish and Persian aristocracy are said to use almond oil, the Spanish and Italian, olive oil. For Britain I would recommend the unsalted kind of butter made into ghee, or the very best quality margarine which also yields to being clarified into ghee.

Meat of all kinds, poultry and fish can all go into happy partnership with rice in a pillau, even as they do in a mulligatawny. With such a wide variety, therefore, some versions must perforce stand on a specially high plane.

If made with real care, producing a pillau can be a wearying business. So, start off with a willing desire to achieve the best result. For your first effort, it is advisable to grudge neither time, trouble nor cost. Have everythin fresh and of the best quality, though in your later experiments you will learn how to use up left-overs, and to economise in other ways.

After the rice and the fat, comes the quality of onion, garlic, almonds and raisins, particularly if some of the almonds are going to be ground in the masala. The onions must be hard, and the garlic unshrivelled and unstained with age.

In the South, it is usual to serve a pillau quite dry, with a special partner usually a korma. When the pillau is made with less spices, the korma will be made more spicy. In most parts of India the pillau is cooked separately up to the lasat stages of cooking and so is the korma, and then they are mixed in one pan to complete the cooking before being dished for the table. I think serving the pillau dry, and serving the korma separately, has obvious advantages for international guests, particularly if some of them are vegetarians. This, however, does not rule out the fact that a mixed dish, i.e. cooked with the korma, has a distinctly different taste which some people like better.

Half a pound of meat and 2 cups of rice, with 1- ½ cups of thee would do; ½ -1 cup fresh dahi, 4-6 peppercorns, 2 onion choor, salt, 3-3 ½ cups meat stock, large pinch of haldi, 2-4 oz. Almonds and raisins each, 4-6 cloves, ½ -1 in. cinnamon. This simplest version is made with no chilli. The modern versions have chilli, and av ery hot pillau is not uncommon. For the same proportion of rice and meat, a more elaborate version could be made by adding to the above ingredients:

½ teaspoon jeera seeds
¼ teaspoon dania seeds
¼ teaspoon khus khus
A bit of green ginger, chooped up
1-2 onions, cut in rings
A few more of garlic choor
A few more peppercorns
A little more salt

If you normally like to soak the rice before cooking it, you might prefer to do so for an hour or two. I prefer not to soak it at all and I spread the washed rice on a cloth to get it quite dry.

In some of the fat crisp-fry the onion rings and put them aside. In the remaining fat, fry each of the spices separately and then the raisins and the almonds. The almonds, if raw, will have to be soaked in tepid water and their skins will then slip off more easily. Bought roasted almonds save time.

Make a masala with the spices and a few of the almonds, salt and a little of the dahi to “touch” the stone. Mix this with the meat bits and the rest of the dahi and put aside for a while.

Fry the onion and garlic choor in the rest of the ft in another pan. When it is golden-brown put in the dry rice with your fingers so that the grains fall in separately. Stir carefully for 5-8 minutes, till every grain is coloured. Pour in half of the boiling stock, very slowly into this pan with a constant sizzle and turning the rice over and over. When fully stirred, leave covered on a low heat.

In the other iron pan put in the mixed meat bits, dahi, masala, etc., and fry them for 5-10 minutes. When almost dry, add some of the boiling stock and leave the pan on a low heat till nearly done.

When the rice is also nearly done, add to it the contents of the other pan, and the rest of the stock, and leave covered to complete the cooking. You could then put the dish into an oven.

The garnishing in a pillau is an art in itself. In some versions the pieces of meat are taken out and placed on top of the rice, which is put on a flat dish. The onion rings, and the halved fried almonds and raisings then make a border or a pattern of ridges on the main mass. Hard-boiled eggs cut into quarters, may also be standing around, as though saluting the rice mound. I was once faced with a pillau that was so well “decorated” with almond., raisins, and bright rosepetals, that little else was visible till you attacked the whole pretty well, because the meat was deeper in a middle layer. It really was lovely to look at and it seemed a pity to have to disturb this delicious work of art. The taste was worthy of the appearance, too. The top may sometimes also be patterned with shimmering bright silver and gold leaf. This is a lovely speciality of the North.

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