Dindugul Thalapakattu Mutton Briyani

Making Dindugul famous thalapakattu briyani is quite like a dream for me, i tasted this flavourful briyani long back. Dindugal is a city in Tamilnadu state of Southern part of India,this city is famous for its fort, locks and steel safes, also very popular for thalapakattu or thalapakatti briyani. This briyani is quite special in taste as its goes for special rice called Seeraga samba rice and the slow cooking process.I was planning to make this mutton briyani since a long,finally i prepared them for our today's lunch.Thalapakattu briyani tastes surely different from other briyanis you have already tasted.

The secret of this briyani is to grind each ingredients and frying them until a nice aroma comes from. This briyani will definitely goes for a time consuming cooking process but i will definitely says that its worth to give a try this super flavourful,inviting briyani. You can prepared this briyani either with chicken or mutton, i went for mutton and used usual basmati rice as i dont get seeraga samba rice here.Sending to Asiya Omar's Feast of Sacrifice.

1kg Mutton (cut as medium size pieces)
2nos Onions
2nos Tomatoes
1tsp Ginger paste
1tsp Garlic paste
4nos Green chillies
1/2cup Mint leaves
1/4cup Coriander leaves
1/2cup Grated coconut
2nos Bayleaves
3nos Cloves
2nos Cinnamon sticks
1no Cardamom
1tsp Roasted cumin powder
3cups Basmati rice
Oil
Ghee
1/2 Lemon

For marination:
1cup Yogurt
1/2tsp Ginger garlic paste
2tsp Red chilly powder
2tsp Coriander powder
1/4tsp Turmeric powder
1tsp Garam masala powder
1tbsp Lemon juice
Salt

Marniate the mutton pieces with all the ingredients under the list 'for marination' and keep aside atleast for 2-3 hours, even more better if you prepared it overnite and keep in fridge.

Wash the basmati rice twice and soak with enough water for 15minutes.

Now grind the onions with green chillies,coriander leaves, mint leaves as coarse paste.

Grind the tomatoes as coarse paste and keep aside.

Grind the coconut as fine paste and extract 2cups of coconut milk and keep aside.

Pressure cook the marinated mutton pieces upto three whistles with a cup of water. Once the steam gets released, strain the stock from the cooked meat and keep the meat and the stock aside.

In a large vessel, heat the oil and ghee.. Fry the bayleaves, cloves,cardamom,cinnamon sticks until they turns brown, add immediately the coarse onion paste and fry for few minutes.

Add now the tomato paste, ginger garlic paste and fry everything until the raw smell goes away,finally add the cumin powder and fry againfor few minutes.

Now add the cooked mutton pieces and cook for few more minutes.

Meanwhile strain the excess water from the soaked rice, add this rice to the cooking meat mixture and cook covered for 5minutes in low flame.

Add the 2cups of coconut milk and cook for 5minutes, once its starts bubbling, add the 3cups of meat cooked stock water, salt (if needed) and cook in medium low flame.

Mine took 15minutes to get ready, once the rice cooked well, squeeze out the juice from half of the lemon and give a stir.

Serve hot with raita and hard boiled eggs.