Persian · Main
Zereshk Polo ba Morgh
- Advanced
- 55 min
- roughly 4 of 4 for cost
Leads with a floral thread lifting the aroma, richness that coats and comforts, closing toasted and warm.
Ingredients
- 500 g aged basmati rice
- 3 L water, for the par-boil
- 60 g fine salt, for the par-boil water
- 1 g saffron threads
- 5 g caster sugar, for grinding with the saffron
- 1.2 kg bone-in skinless chicken thighs
- 300 g onions, thinly sliced
- 90 ml sunflower oil
- 60 g unsalted butter
- 5 g ground turmeric
- 2 g black pepper
- 8 g salt, for the chicken
- 40 g thick plain yoghurt
- 60 g dried barberries
- 20 g caster sugar
The skills inside
Steaming: basket, leaf and lidSoaking dried goods back to life
Allergen screen
Found: dairy
Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.
Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.
Method
- Grind the saffron with the 5 g sugar to a powder and steep it in 60 ml water just off the boil until the liquid is deep orange, about 20 minutes. 20 min
- Fry the onions in 45 ml of the oil until deep gold, add the turmeric, pepper, chicken, 8 g salt and half the saffron water, cover and cook low until the thigh meat slides off the bone under a spoon.
- Rinse the rice until the water runs clear, then boil it in the 3 L of water with the 60 g salt until a grain bends without snapping and a bitten one still shows a chalky core, 5 to 7 minutes; drain at once. 7 min
- Fold two ladles of drained rice with the yoghurt and a spoonful of saffron water, spread it over the remaining 45 ml oil and half the butter in the pot and press it flat.
- Mound the rest of the rice in a cone, drive five holes to the base with a spoon handle, drizzle over 60 ml water, wrap the lid in a tea towel and steam on the lowest heat until the pot smells of toasted crust, 45 to 50 minutes. 50 min
- Swirl the rinsed barberries with the 20 g sugar in the last of the butter off the heat for under a minute, just until they plump and go glossy red, then scatter them over the rice with the rest of the saffron.
How to tell it is going right
This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the techniques it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.
Soaking dried goods back to life 69 recipes
- Fully submerged with room to swell: the level is well above everything at the start and still above it at the end.
- Given the full time, and judged by what is in the bowl rather than by the hours on the clock.
- Tested at the CENTRE of the largest piece, cut or pressed. Anything with a hard dry core will still have one after cooking, because the outside softens first and stops the water getting further in.
- The soaking water was dealt with on purpose: kept because it holds flavour, or thrown away because it holds what should not be eaten, but never simply left undecided.
- Drained before it is used, so the dish does not silently gain all the water that came with it.
Where it goes wrong Too little water, or too little time. The pieces swell until they are packed tight against each other and the ones in the middle never fully take up water; they will not soften later in the dish either, so the finished plate has hard pieces scattered through it.
Steaming: basket, leaf and lid 130 recipes
- Steam was running before the food went in: the water at a rolling boil and vapour coming steadily through the basket, rather than the whole thing warming up together.
- Nothing touches the water at any point: the food sits clear of it throughout, and the level neither drops enough to boil dry nor rises enough to wet it.
- The lid stayed on. Every lift costs the chamber its heat, and the number of lifts should be as close to none as the dish allows.
- Lifted out, the surface is glossy and plump with its colour heightened rather than dulled: greens brighter than they went in, not olive.
- Cooked through with the shape intact: it yields at the centre without having slumped or split, and there is no more than a spoonful of clean condensate beneath it.
Where it goes wrong The lid was loose or dripping and the condensate fell back onto the food, so it arrives waterlogged and pale with its seasoning washed down into the bottom of the dish.
At the Table
- The Pour
- Chardonnay (village Burgundy)
- Also Right
- Chenin Blanc
- From the Taps
- Bière de garde
- Zero-Proof
- Verbena iced tea
Chicken is wine’s most agreeable partner. Match the SAUCE, not the bird: cream to oak, tomato to Sangiovese’s acid, herbs to Loire whites.
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