[Hyderabadi]

I think this was a topic started by lonelyaztec (where is she!).

I'll start with Hyderabad:

Paradise - Popular - In Secunderabad really)
Garden Restaurant - close to above
Madina - Near Charminar, old city - the original
Niagara - they have a couple of branches
Hyderabad House - they have a variety of traditional Hyderabadi dishes.
Narmada - a slightly different taste, but one of my personal favorites
Azizia - near Hyderabad Railway station
The Nizam Club - authentic, you would have to persuade a member to take you there.
Any Muslim wedding - you will have to get invited

Cannot vouch for the current taste and quality of the above recommendations, it's been three years since I had any Hyderabadi Biryani  . Plan to fix that later this month!  

Recipe on FoodNetwork:
http://www.foodnetwo...6_15804,00.html


For a different take on Biryani try the Andhra version. Speaks with a green chilli accent.

Indu Delux - Next to Reserve Bank of India, and my former office  
Abhiruchi - Secunderabad, close to Paradise (the restaurant)
Rajdoot - Next to Telephone Bhavan

[jyotirmoy]

In Delhi:
Lazzez Durbar next to Rajdoot hotel
Garib Nawaz near Nizammudin Darga
By the great master who operates from Matka Pir near Pragati Maidan.. but you have to order minimum 1 Kg & pick it up in your own utensil.
Karims

[Hyderabadi]

At home, when mom is in a good mood we get Kheema Biryani.

Kheema cooked lightly with ginger-garlic paste, elaichi, lavang chilli powder and salt and keep aside. Add a few nalli's (shanks with no meat on them).

Semi cook basmati rice.

Deep fry some onions, keep the ghee/oil.

Mix lime juice, salt, ginger-garlic paste a few finely chopped green chillies to taste.

Finely chop some coriander and mint leaves.

Mix some saffron in a small cup of milk.

Assemble the Biryani. One layer of rice, one layer of kheema, sprinkle the lime juice mix and a little saffron milk and the The final layer should be rice. Dhumka for I think about 20 minutes.

Sprinkle deep fried onions, finely chopped coriander/mint on top and serve.


Sorry my recipe writing skills are not that great, but that's about it

[Hyderabadi]

Thanks for moving this!

[Aadil]

In Mumbai there are a few good places which I would recommend for Biryani and the best one is Jafferbhai's Delhi Durbar Restaurant and Take Away chain of shops all over the city. The DD brothers split I guess and are on their own now so the best one is this one!!! There is café Noorani at Haji Ali which is also pretty good and café Bahar at Flora Fountain too. Lots of small places that serve a good biryani too but then there are too many to mention out here (will mention them as I recollect the names later on)!!!

Cheers,
Aadil.

[gautam]

Dear Aadil,

Hope you will read this. My great interest has been following biriyani masters in kolkata. In this respect, it is my feeling, owing to price point and many other constraints, that restaurants are never able to serve the best biriyanis. I Kolkata at least, the restaurant cooks are called "mistries" and never ustads, and I have my opinions of the quality of restaurant cooking that does not make any sense writing about.

On the other hand, there are the cooks who are invited to prepare the marriage feasts for important families. These are definitely a different class and are not constrained by pricing limits and other economic considerations [to a certain point]. Their biryanis are definitely worth appreciating as works of culinary art, in every possible sense. I have written about this in some detail elsewhere. My great regret is the two or three I knew are now deceased, and I have no more contacts with India, especially with Calcutta. The Calcutta style I am referring to is not the idiot Metiaburj bversion coarse with chili pepper, but a different thing altogether, no chilies, no cilantro leaf, very delicate, very rich, created for weddings.

Similarly, in your city, there will be specialist masters who will be especially esteemed for their special "touch.' I fyou know of any, or if these traditions still exist, where individual ustaads are approached for their services, it would be wonderful to ask the ladies of your family for their knowledge/recommendations of who these living treasures might be and create a list, perhaps for each region or biryani style.

Someone went to Shadab in Hyderabad, and then said it was a layered cooked biryani. I am sure there are better biryani masters in HYd., good as Shadab is. Someone else went to Nizamuddin, Delhi, and taped an alleged master, who either did not show what he was capable of or was merely incompetent. Anyway, maybe this is a foolish venture, but creating a list of the private master cooks/caterers might be one way to identify the best biryani makers in India.

[Hyderabadi]

Gautam da, I agree a 100% with you on the biryani in restaurants. The best place to eat a good biryani, for me, is at a Muslim wedding. Melt in your mouth meat and each grain of rice bursting with subtle flavor. Better yet at a Chowki Dinner:

Quote

The Chowki dinner of Andhra Pradesh is very famous. It is offered by the tourism department of the State. The typical Chowki dinner is served on a low table (Chowki) around which 8 people can sit. This is served in typical Nawabi style, where authentic Hyderabadi food is served course by course. Along with the exotic dinner, the majestic Deccan ambiance accompanied by traditional entertainment like Ghazals, add to the taste and enjoyment.

More: http://www.indiasite...sh/cuisine.html

[gautam]

Dear Hyderabadi,

Why wait for imponderables like invitations to State dinners and weddings? What if all your friends suddenly decide to embrace celibacy? Such things have happened you know, when someone like Meher Baba or Ignatius Loyola happened upon a band of carefree merrymakers like yourself!!!

So why not search out the maestros behind these affairs and create a Rolodex? Then,  it becomes a matter of coordinating your purse and affairs with their availability on a contract or other negotiated  basis. Zimple.

Everything in India has a backdoor solution also: as a small person, building up a personal relationship with a Master Chef's khandan, his 'working family' has the advantage that they will take pity on you and often sell a small tiffin carrier full of biryani, when they are contracted for big occasions. This is their personal affair, no questions asked. And you also are getting a bargain, highest quality, at a fair price.

The first step is to find and create this list of names. Samajh gaye na? Without that, nothing can move forward. And this little black book should have grades,  and for each city. Not too difficult: the most khandani people [not the newly rich buddhoos] should know who the best ustad is, yes?

[jyotirmoy]

Absolutely correct.... building up a personal relationship with a Master Chef's khandan, his 'working family' is the only way to have a taste of the real thing.
An early morning walk thru the Turkman gate in Delhi way back in the 70's brought me face to face with one such Master.

[gautam]

Please go on Jyotida, you left us off at a cliffhanger, like the old Phantom comic strips that used to run in the Bengali papers.

Taar por?

And please, don't break into song [one never knows what  you and your jigri dost, that elderly monk, have been up to, this festive season ] Taar aar por nei, nei kono thikana... that is for Hemonto!

Are you changing from Jyotida to Ghanada? But that happened in Prof. Shonku's lab, if you remember, all changed and locked away in bottles. Ghanada used to do what you are doing to extract a plateful of hot cutlets, several cups of tea, and then fortifying himself with an array of cigareetes, on one of which he was taking his inimitable shooktaans, settled into the aaramkedara, and launched into another story: Chomolungma...Chomolohari

Early morning walk: you meet a bearded gent: how do you recognize him as a true master of biryani? This is really amazing, Madame Blavatsky and her Himalayan Mahatmas, only much better, someone really useful! I promise not to tease you more if you will tell us all!

And what are you doing staying awake on Christamas night, when Santa Claus will climb down your chimbly, to see who has been naughty and who has been nice? Reading biryani posts at that? Naughty!

Edited by gautam, 25 December 2007 - 10:48 AM.

[jyotirmoy]

That early morning walk was for a very different purpose. I was to meet a newly acquired friend and then go over to his uncle's place to watch his pigeons. We went to the roof of his house where he had enclosures after enclosures housing the most beautful pigeons that I ever had seen. On that clear autumn morning the sky was blue and these magnificent birds flew in circles over us.
While being mesmerised watching the birds I had failed to notice a grand old man who had taken his seat on a charpoy and was deeply engrossed in the act of picking rice. He seemed to be picking each grain and examining it as if it was a gem. A quiet enquiry and I was informed that this gentleman a revered person in the whole mohalla was the master of Biriyani. I was also told about the eccentricities that he displayed and also of his violent temper.
Tar por? Tar ar sotti kono por neyee.... that day a whole new world opened up to me and I realised that my knowledge of Biriyani was just nothing, nothing at all.

[gautam]

Jyotida, this great master will have gone to his heavenly abode by this time [but one can always inquire, can one not?], but surely he will have left his family, and some deserving shagird or two that he would have recognized and trained.

You have your friend, you know the mohalla, where it is, so it is possible to return and inquire: because you "knew" the grand old master, the people will understand the seriousness of your quest. People in India respond to such respectful, disciplic quests in very strong empathic fashion. They surely will point you to his family, who at least will relate more of his life and vision to you. I know you are a very busy man, and all of this may not be posible, given all your other responsibilities, and neck problems. But there may be someone who may be willing to undertake the task. There will be a person going there from Washington soon, a restaurant owner and food lover, and a relative of Kundan Sehgal, who may be persuaded to look into the matter if you find me a name and an address, mohalla even. You would love to meet this person!

I feel that masters like these are artists and their art is transient, but no less valuable than sculptors and painters or writers. Indeed, maybe even more,  because they plumb a dimension that we have not been able to describe or communicate very well, we humans whose humanity and culture is based on communication and whose socialization is based on sharing food: taste and smell.

Taste and smell are two facets that we have difficulty communicating well to others. Yet what do these masters do? They create this ultimate communication medium via food. And food is THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR IN HUMAN SOCIALIZATION, BUILDING AND MAINTING SOCIAL BONDS.

So, the importance of these community chefs are as great as poets and writers, painters and scultpors, who all provide certain important bonds that hold our society together. I would think that a a few Muslim chefs have done more for the unity and goodwill in the country than 1 million idiot and wrongheaded so-called self-centered secularists.

Japan has a system called LIVING NATIONAL TREASURES. I would love to see a similar institution appear in India, to recognize masters of folk culture.

So Jyotida, please, should you have a spare moment, try to contact your pigeon friend, or that mohalla, and see if any further legacy or legatee(s0 of the master may be traced. You will be contributing in ways you cannot imagine to national harmony, and to the preservation of rare artists.

[jyotirmoy]

Bhai Gautam when I said that a new world opened to me I didn't mean the Biriyani only, a new world of culture, art, etiquette, cuisine opened up for me.
The short walk from the Turkman gate brought me very far from the Delhi of Green Park where I used to live. The tailors here worked stooping over the embroideries that they were making, in the silence of summer noon a physically challenged person sat on the window sill busy with his awesome calligraphy. In the midst of this other world Inayat chacha painstakingly picked the rice. Not a single grain should be broken…. Use the meat from the legs for any thing else you want but not for Biriyani… Bewaquf your degchis are for cooking rice not Biriyani… surface surface it is surface that you need…. Embers below and embers above…. Inayat chacha  said.
This world continued till the bulldozers of Sanjay Gandhi appeared on the scene like the legendary Kalapahar. The calligraphic life and this world was scarred and broken for ever. Inayat chacha went away to Agra and subsequently to Bhopal. His two sons run an automobile parts shop in Bhopal.

[gautam]

Dear Jyotida,

Thank you so much for sharing these precious personal memories on an auspicious day. The silent service and care of masters like Inayat Saheb are never lost, they live on amongst those they have bestowed their love, their sense of honor, service and their parampara, the cumulative burden of knowledge.

Today being Christmas, it would be apropriate to share a fragment of the essential message of the person whose birth we celebrate, and who is forgotten amidst all the adventitious tamasha:

Jesus very clearly explained something to his disciples: "You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all." (Mark 10:42-43).

And why? "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." (Mark 10:45).

Son of Man has an interesting etymology: son of Adam, where Adam literally means "soil" or "dust" in Hebrew, from which we get aadmi, and so literally, maatir manush.

What would maatir manush mean in Bengali? Something along these lines: someone wholly at one with himself and the universe, spontaneous, guileless, inside andd outside the same, someone who has no apon and por, who takes all into his/her heart.

Inayat Saheb,  your Chachaji, comes close to this model, do you not suppose? A father figure hiding behind his eccentric exterior? So it is fitting that  on this holy day we are led to pay our own humble respects to this soul with these auspicious attributes, his silent service to all.

Some day, perhaps you will be moved to share more of his gifts, biryani teachings and other things with us, elsewhere.

Namaste.

[jyotirmoy]

Yes so many matir manush who enriched our culture need to be respected and remembered.

[gautam]

Returning to our tentative biryani project, regarding the creating a database of traditional masters reknowned for their contract work

1. from Delhi you mentioned someone near Pragati Maidan: name, further info? Any comments, your own personal experiences
2. Did Inayat Saheb leave any shagird in Delhi? THis inquiry can be directed at his sons in Bhopal. It would be uncommon for a master of his stature to not have trained at least some few in the locality.

3. Inayat Saheb's present descendant's in Bhopal:

a) sons and daughter's in law, do they carry on his expertise, in addition to their other business [even in a purely private setting, for their own enjoyment]

do they know of other distinguished utads in Bhopal, which has a long, rich history as a Muslim principality?

These are some questions they will answer satisfactorily only to you, not to any "outsiders" who care to put the same questions to them. So some day, in the spirit of service to the memory of all these great masters, including your own grandfather, please get your daughter or some young person to write or contact them and get some answers! We in India love to let our history slip away between our fingers, and then it is too late!

In the very early 70s, i was  at one of the Mughal monuments in Agra, and there was a bronze ring on a Mughal door coming loose, possibly for a long time. Some enterprising backpacker from another nation energetically was twisting it this way and that. Many Indian tourists also were passing by, some watching him with interest, some frowning, none stopping him from trying to loosen and wrench this ring out the door. This was a thick metal piece, a bit smaller than a glass bangle, but much thicker, beautifiully wrought, with a slight greenish patina, inserted into a substantial wooden door, that was not very tall but had other metallic  reinforcements and ornamentation. I was pretty amazed then and remain so to this day at the things we let go, on account of our fragile sense of owning our own history.

[jyotirmoy]

The once little known Mian Baboo Khan of Matka Pir dargah near Pragati Maidan has become some sort of an enterprise now. He has a telephone now and can be contacted at 23371454. His Biriyani is a bit oily and spicy.

My choice would be Zahid Qureshi. This Querishi clan are butchers for generations and the cuts used by Zahid Mian are superb. The use of lots of marrow bones gives his Biriyani an unique flavour and his Biriyani has almost no trace of oil. He can be contacted at 23520607.

I am sorry Gautam bhai I have no information about Inayat Saheb's shagrids or his family. In the eighties my connections with the"other" Delhi started fading out. Things changed a lot and very rapidly.
I will try to put together a recipe for one of Inayat Saheb's Biriyani as my tribute & Pronams to him.

[gautam]

Thank you Jyotida, you have helped opened our LITTLE GREEN BOOK OF BIRYANI MASTERS. Now it's Hyderabadi's task to winkle out who cooks the State dinners and who all are reputed to be the best contract masters in Hbd and AP. We have Mumbai, Bhopal, Lucknow, Rampur, Aurangabad, CCU : at least those towns to cover yet in this database.

DELHI.

1.  SHRI JYOTIRMOY NIYOGI, OLD MONK EXTRAORDINAIRE. KEEPER OF BIRYANI LORE.

2.  MIAN ZAHID QUREISHI "My choice would be Zahid Qureshi. This Querishi clan are butchers for generations and the cuts used by Zahid Mian are superb. The use of lots of marrow bones gives his Biriyani an unique flavour and his Biriyani has almost no trace of oil. He can be contacted at 23520607."

3. MIAN BABOO KHAN 23371454. 'His Biriyani is a bit oily and spicy.'

[Abhijit Sur]

Why all of you don't try this Biriyani?
 untitled.JPG   313.48K   12 downloads

 untitled1.JPG   309.19K   12 downloads

Biriyani from Royal Indian Hotel, Burrabazar, Kolkata and Madina and Diwan of Hyderabad are also good

[Nattusbs]

Abhijit

Tne 2nd photo looks like camel biryani to me - I think I see 2 humps.

Nattusbs