Easy chickpea biryani

Have you ever had a biryani? It’s basically a curry with rice, but it’s all cooked together in the oven so the rice soaks up all of the curry goodness.
I’ve avoided making a biryani in the past because honestly, baking rice has always scared me a bit – eeeek, how much water should you use, and eeeeek, don’t you just end up with strange, crispy, roasted rice? and eeeeek, how does it ever cook properly?
(yes, I can be a bit overdramatic sometimes)

But actually, once I decided to give this chickpea biryani a go, it was really easy. You need to add what looks like far too much water – you’ll wonder how it will end up looking like anything other than a swimming pool with a few pieces of rice floating in it. But once the rice absorbs everything, you’re left with perfectly cooked rice and lovely soft veggies.

The key, I found, was to stir everything pretty often – at least a few times during cooking. That way, it’ll all cook nice and evenly, and you’ll avoid having any undercooked areas of rice.
So stir, stir, stir!
(and then stir a little bit more if you can bring yourself to)

In some Indian restaurants, a biryani is served with a separate dish of curry sauce to pour over the top. I’m not going to lie, this works really well – the biryani itself is slightly on the dry side.
But, since I can usually only bring myself to make one dish at a time, and I didn’t have any jars of sauce on hand to crack open, we had ours on its own, with a dollop of chutney at the side, and it was just loooovely. Obviously mango chutney is the go-to chutney to have alongside Indian food (at least in this country!), but we just had a generic fruit chutney, and it worked really well. So it’s up to you whether to have a separate curry sauce to pour over your chickpea biryani, or whether to be lazy and go for some chutney instead.
Either way, make this chickpea biryani, realise how easy it is, and enjoy!


Easy chickpea biryani
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Print Pin CommentIngredients
- 1 red onion
- 200 g cauliflower ~2 cups, cut into bite-size pieces
- 200 g potatoes 2 medium/small potatoes, cut into fairly small dice
- 1 tbsp oil
- Salt
- Black pepper
- 3 tbsp curry paste I used a tikka masala paste
- 750 ml hot vegetable stock ~3 cups
- 100 g green beans ~1 cup, cut into 2 inch chunks
- 350 g basmati rice ~1 3/4 cups
- 400 g tin chickpeas 240g, or ~1 1/4 cups, when drained, drained
- Juice of 1/2 a lemon
- 3 tbsp fresh coriander cilantro, chopped
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 190°C (Gas Mark 5 / 375°F).
- Peel the red onion, and cut it into 1cm wedges. Add it to a large baking dish, along with the cauliflower and potato chunks. Toss the vegetables in a little oil, and season with salt and pepper.
- Roast for about 30 minutes, until the potatoes are fairly soft.
- While the vegetables are roasting, add the curry paste to the hot vegetable stock, and mix well until fully combined.
- When the vegetables are ready, add the green beans, rice, chickpeas and stock to the baking dish, and mix thoroughly. Cover with foil, and return to the oven for about an hour, stirring every fifteen or twenty minutes, until the rice has absorbed the liquid, and the rice and potatoes are totally soft. If the liquid has been absorbed before the rice and potatoes are soft, just add a dash more liquid and return to the oven.
- When everything is fully cooked, stir again, and serve with the lemon juice and fresh coriander.
Nutritional information is approximate, and will depend on your exact ingredients. Please calculate your own nutritional values if you require accuracy for health reasons.
For anyone thinking of trying this recipe – DO IT! It’s become my OH’s favourite dinner (even above my “from scratch” veggie lasagne), it’s so tasty and so easy. I tend to roast the onions, potatoes and cauli separately and mix everything together at the end, but that’s mainly because I don’t have a dish with a lid big enough to fit it all :) but it does mean that there’s a nice mix of textures. I find that it cooks in my oven quicker than stated (the rice is cooked in about 45 mins) although my oven does run hot (keep meaning to get an oven thermometer). I like make raita to go with it (yoghurt plus mint sauce from a jar). Enjoy!
Awww thanks so much Lauren, what a lovely comment :) so glad you guys like it so much! :)
This was sooooo delicious and sooooooo easy. One of the best things I’ve ever made. My whole family loved it. I’m adding peas and cashews next time.
Thanks so much for the comment Paula, really glad you liked it :D cashews would be a great addition!
I tried this and love it!
Having read the comments above I may just try making it in the slow cooker next time!
Glad you enjoyed it, thanks Meg! :)
Very tasty looking – lovely colour.
I’ve not made a biryani before, this looks like a really easy version though so I’ll have to be brave too :)
I love chick peas in curry. It’s a nice way to add some protein an they are really cheap too.
Well, I already wanted Indian food for lunch, but now I REALLY want Indian food for lunch! This biryani sounds delicious, and looks super easy — yay!
what a lovely, comforting recipe! I do love a good briyani and my husband calls me the chickpea queen ;)
I must confess, I never understand that British curry house thing of serving a slop of vegetable curry over the biryani. It just hides the taste, might as well have plain rice! :-D Yours looks very nice, maybe with some raita and pickles on the side? Bet it’d be lovely.
Haha yes it always seems a bit strange to me to smother it in sauce! It was perfect with a dollop of chutney, raita would be great too! :)
You already know that sadly I can’t do chickpeas (a nutritionist that can’t do chickpeas is a bit weird, I know!), but I LOVE this idea very much, Becca, and plan on making it with black lentils. Thanks for sharing this. It really does sound lovely. :-)
I absolutely love lentils and I’m sure it’d be great with those – let me know how you find it! :)