Recipe- Making The Very Famous Afghani Kabuli Pulao

There’s a very nice Afghan restaurant here and I just love love the food there. One of our favorites is Kabuli Palaw or simple Afghani Pulao. This pulao is a traditional Afghan dish and no celebration is complete without it. Usually it has meat in it too but of course since I made it, it had to be vegetarian.

In fact it’s almost vegan too, just soak the saffron in some water or non-dairy milk in place of regular milk and then this will be all vegan. The vegetarian kabuli pulao has 2 main ingredients – carrots and raisins.Kabuli pulao is not your ordinary dish, not something which you would make everyday. It’s for special occasions because it’s rich and not too light on your stomach. While it’s a complete meal in itself if it’s made with meat, but with a vegetarian version like this, you probably need to serve it with a side dish like borani banjan or some other veggies and salads.

The most important thing for making kabuli palaw is to choose the right type of rice. I used Sella Basmati Rice and it works so well in making pulao, biryanis etc.

Ingredients

Rice

2 cups basmati rice
2-3 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cardamom powder [from 6-7 green cardamom pods]
cumin powder to sprinkle
pinch of saffron soaked in 1 tablespoon of milk
water as required

Carrots and Raisins

1.25 cups carrot shredded or thinly sliced
1/3 cup raisins
5 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 tablespoons granulated white sugar

Method

* Soak basmati rice in enough water for 45 minutes. Drain the rice and set aside.

* In a large pan, bring water to boil, add around 2-3 teaspoons of salt to the water as it boils.

* When water comes to a boil, add the soaked & drained rice to it. Cook for 10 minutes, stirring at regular intervals in between. We don't want to fully cook the rice and it must not turn mushy. Just like we cook the pasta till al dente (firm to bite), the rice should also be cooked to a point when it's still firm. If you soak the rice for 45 minutes to 1 hour, it should not take more than 10 minutes for rice to reach that stage.

* Remove the pan from heat as soon as rice is done and then drain. Set aside.

* While the rice was cooking in step 1, heat vegetable oil in a pan. Once oil is hot, add the shredded carrots.

* Cook for 1-2 minutes and then add 2 tablespoons of sugar and mix.

* Once the color of the carrot starts changing a bit, add raisins and cook for another minute or two.

* Remove from heat and drain on a paper towel. Don't drain the oil that you used for frying the carrots and raisins, we will use it the next steps.

* Now take a large sheet of aluminium foil and place the fried carrot and raisins in the center.

* Close all sides to form an aluminium foil packet with the carrot and raisins inside.

* In the meanwhile, transfer the cooked rice back to the pan again.

* Place the pan on low heat with a skillet underneath (see picture above).

* Sprinkle cardamom powder on top of the rice and then place the prepared aluminium packet on one side of the rice.

* Now add the oil that was leftover after frying with carrots and raisins to the rice. Just drop it all over.

* Cover the pan tightly and let the rice steam with the carrots and raisins on low heat for 20-30 minutes. In the meanwhile, in a small bowl, soak some saffron in a tablespoon of milk.

* Remove rice from the pan and transfer to serving bowl. Pour the soaked saffron all over the rice. Sprinkle some cumin powder.

* Open the aluminium foil packet and top the rice with the carrots and raisins.

* Enjoy Afghani Pulao as such or serve with a side of borani banjan.