Hyderabadi haleem

Jasirah Dalvi’s Hyderabadi haleem combines chicken and broken wheat into a thick, porridge-like preparation. Her version uses a spiced chicken marinade, ready chicken stock and a ghee-garlic finish; she describes haleem’s association with Hyderabad and its introduction to India.

The chicken is marinated with ginger-garlic paste, coriander powder, cumin powder, green-chilli paste, black pepper powder and salt, then boiled with water. Once cooked, it is shredded and set aside, while its cooking liquid is reserved.

Broken wheat is boiled with ghee and its own water, stirring at intervals. The reserved chicken cooking liquid, supplied chicken stock and shredded chicken are added to the wheat and cooked together, with further stirring.

Salt is adjusted and the mixture is brought to a porridge-like consistency. In a separate finishing stage, sliced garlic is fried in another portion of ghee until golden. This garlic-ghee temper is poured over the cooked haleem.

The haleem is served hot with coriander leaves, chopped green chillies, julienned ginger, lemon wedges and fried onion. These distinct finishing ingredients sit above the combined chicken and wheat, adding fresh, sharp and fried notes to the thick base.