Rice, unbeatable Iranian style
Posted: 14 July 2011 Filed under: KITCHEN, for recipes, Rice, plain and tahdig, Uncategorized | Tags: booteh_recipes, food_photography, main_dish, Persian_cuisine, rice, tahdig 17 CommentsThe high quality rice cooked Iranian style is simply unbeatable. Whether it is mixed polo or plain, white chelo, soaked and drained or not drained (as in kateh or dami), the unique steam-cooking method employed to prepare Iranian-style rice results in a perfection of slender, fluffy grains with a heavenly taste and fragrance.
In addition, tah-dig, the crunchy part of rice, literally meaning “bottom of the pot,” is a by-product , and much loved, of Iranian style rice cooking, which could take several tastes and forms… I have explained all these simple yet delicate points and procedures in a “culinary memoir” linked on the sidebar of this blog. Meanwhile,
here is a brief instruction as we will be needing it here and now too!
The following is what you would need to do whatever type of plain or mixed rice you want to cook:
- Wash the rice – that is, rake with fingers and rinse at least three or four times until the water runs clear
- Soak for overnight, or at least 4-5 hours in advance in a bowl of lukewarm salted water.
- Bring about three liters of water to a rolling boil in a big pot with a capacity of four or more liters of water.
- Pour off the salted water from the top of your rice bowl and add the rice to your boiling pot.
- Let the rice boil until the magical moment when you judge the grains are cooked at the core but not too soft.
- Drain in a fine-meshed colander. Wash the starch from the pot and put it back on the top of the stove to get it completely dry.
- Heat two tablespoons of cooking oil in the bottom of the pot at medium heat before heaping your rice into it.
- You could put a piece of bread, slices of potatoes, or simply the rice to make different types of tahdig.
- In a small pot, mix two tbsp of water and two more tablespoons of oil and once heated, sprinkle it over your rice mound; this will help produce more steam at the outset and keep the grains separated.
- Make a hole in the middle of the mound with your spoon’s handle and cover the pot with the lid. When you notice steams building inside the pot, wrap the lid in a clean kitchen cloth and replace and let it stem-cook for at least an hour. This is called, dam kardan – the secret to the unbeatable Iranian-style rice cooking.
My Caldron 
خود برنج مهم نیست اصلا، مهم ته دیگه!
بله، “بعضی” ها با نظر شما کاملا موافقند 🙂 در ضمن مرسی از اینکه به این خانه سر زدی
من هم ته دیگ از غذای اصلی دوستتردارم مخصوصن اون ته دیگ نونی رو۰۰۰
بی صبرانه منتظرم کتابتون رو بخونم 🙂
ممممم، به قول خارجی ها یامی…
البته من فکر میکنم در مسئله مهمه ته دیگ یک سری ریزکاری های دیگری هم در کنار دم کردن قرار میگیرن مثل استفاده از زعفران البته به اندازه کافی برای دادن طعم و رنگ!
کاملا درست میگید سینا.. معلومه حسابی وارد هستید! منظورم این بود که نکته متمایز دم کردن در طبخ ایرانی بیشتر مربوط به فرم برنج حاصله هست، ته دیگ “تریک”های خودش رو داره همونطور که اشاره کردید :)؛
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I think you meant slices of potatoes, not tomatoes 🙂
Now I wonder… how would it taste with tomatoes… hmmmm… might tase like istanbuli polo.
You are absolutely right! In this case it should read slices of “potatoes” and I am going to edit it right now! However, I DO use slices of tomatoes on top of rice or bread tahdig sometimes to give it a different taste and colour. No, it won’t taste like istanbuli polow, because the amount used is minimal… For chelo kabab for instance a tomato mixed tahdig is not bad at all! Thanks again for your keen attention ! 🙂
Nice. I’m going to try that today. Thanks a lot for sharing the idea.
ممنون از سایت فوق العاده، من چند دوست فرنگی داشتم که در جوانی در ایران کار میکردن و در به در دنبال پلو ایرانی بودن:) راستی از کاهو هم میشه برای ته دیگ استفاده کرد همچنین برای فهمیدن اینکه برنج دم کشیده یا نه میشه انگشت رو خیس کرد و به قابلمه زد،اگر سریع جیلیز ویلیز کرد و بخار شد یعنی دم کشیده
خواهش میشه سینا جان، خوشحالم اینجا رو مفید یافتی. کاهو برای ته دیگ خیلی زود میسوزه مگر اینکه روغن مبسوطی تهِ دیگ بریزید. انگشت رو هر چند خیس به ته دیگ نزنید هاااا 🙂 میسوزه! اگه یک کم آب توی مشت بگیرید و به کناره قابلمه بپاشید و اون صدای جیلیز و ویلیز رو بشنوید (البته بعد از گذشتِ دست کم نیم ساعت) میتونه نشان از دم کشیدن باشه