Biryani in San Diego

Hyderabadi dum biryani

The famous one. Raw marinated meat and par-cooked basmati are layered in the same pot, the lid is sealed, and the whole thing cooks in its own steam — dum — so the rice takes its flavour from the meat as both finish together. Done properly it cannot be stirred back together or reheated into the same dish, which is why it is cooked to order.

Thalapakatti — the Dindigul biryani

This is the one people drive for. Dindigul biryani uses seeraga samba, a short, stubby rice that looks nothing like basmati and behaves nothing like it either — it drinks up far more of the masala and comes out dense and separate rather than long and fluffy. Ours is made with mutton, the way it is made in Dindigul.

If you have only ever had basmati biryani, this is the one to order. It is a genuinely different dish, not a variation.

More on Thalapakatti biryani →

Madras and Vijayawada

Madras biryani is the Tamil city style — lighter on the whole spices, heavier on the shallot and green chilli, cooked with the meat rather than over it. The Vijayawada biryanis come from coastal Andhra and are the hottest we cook, which is the point of them — chicken, egg, fish and paneer, all built on the same Andhra chilli base.

Bhai Veetu — the household biryani

Bhai Veetu means “brother's house”, and the name is the whole idea: this is the biryani cooked in Tamil Muslim homes in Chennai rather than in a shop. It is the gentlest of the five — no heavy hand with the chilli, the spice carried in whole aromatics and curd rather than in ground heat — and it is the one to order for someone who finds the Andhra biryanis too hot.

Feeding a crowd

Bucket biryani serves four and comes in chicken, mutton or paneer. For anything larger than that, we cater — the catering page has the details.