Peeps! It has been a while since I posted a recipe. I really miss blogging these days. Life has become so very busy for me now as the school routine is in full swing with my kids spending longer hours at school. My daughter who used to have fewer hours at school till last year now has full blown timings to get used to. They now have two breaks and planning and executing the additional lunchbox is killing. The drop offs and pickups have to be managed too so that leaves me with little time to blog. Even taking pictures of the dishes I make has taken a back seat. I realised that I had barely a handful of recipes in my backlog and so have planned to keep you all busy in the next few days 🙂
I totally totally love blogging and sharing my recipes with you. Lots of people have asked me where I vanished, but the truth is managing everything single handedly is getting harder than I imagined. As the kids grow, their curriculum also becomes a challenge to deal with. Complex school projects need to be submitted and helping them create such models pretty much sucks my time. But as always, I cannot stay away from the blog for too long and somehow resort to mass manufacturing (cooking a bunch of new recipes on a given day and shooting all of them using the same props and background setting). I know this may seem repetitive but whattodo? What has to be done, has to be done!
Coming to today’s recipe. This delectable pulao recipe is a hidden gem amongst many others in Mrs. Mallika Badrinath’s book on rice recipes. The simplicity of her recipes is perhaps the most charming thing. I love pineapples and have a few recipes on the blog made with this delightful fruit. It is hard to find the perfect pineapple these days although during my childhood we had a few plants growing in our garden. The sweetest and most delicious pineapples made their way to our dining table. All that trouble one took to clean and slice them was totally worth it. Today, we end up buying semi-ripe or sour/bitter kind of pineapples. Somehow the sweet ones almost don’t exist anymore.
During my trip to the groceries last week I found this perfect box of sliced pineapples. The deep yellow colour called out to me and I took that chance of buying a somewhat pricey pack of pineapples. I was so glad when I finally bit into one. The taste was marvellous! Totally worth the money I would say. I knew in an instant that I was going to give this recipe a try and it didn’t disappoint me! I made a really small batch and ended up eating most of it. This is something that will appeal to everyone who likes pulaos and especially rice based desserts. This dish can become a pulao if you cook the rice just right or a dessert if you cook it mushy. It all depends on what you fancy! If you love pineapples I have a couple of recipes you could try. Do scroll down and check them out!
Pineapple Sheera (Semolina Pudding)
Pineapple Saasive (No Cook Pineapple Curry)
Pineapple & Green Chilli Chutney
Want to try this recipe? Save it on Pinterest!
Pineapple Pulao
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup 100 grams basmati rice
- 1-1/4 cups freshly boiled water
- 200 grams 1 cup when finely chopped fresh pineapple * see note
- 4 tablespoons sugar
- 1 tablespoon ghee
- a pinch of saffron soaked in 1 tablespoon milk
- 1/8 th cup cashew nuts or skinless almonds * optional
- a few cashew nuts for garnish
Instructions
- If you are using canned pineapple, drain off the syrup into a separate vessel and chop the fruit. Transfer the pineapple to a saucepan and add the sugar and approx 1/4 cup of water and cook till the pieces soften. Turn off the heat and keep aside. Reduce the sugar if canned pineapple is used.
- Wash the rice but do not soak it. Soak the saffron in a little warm milk and keep aside.
- Grind the cashew nuts to a fine paste using a little water. For garnishing, fry the remaining cashew nuts in some ghee and keep aside.
- Heat half the ghee in a heavy based pan and fry the washed rice for 2-3 minutes. Then add the freshly boiled water and a pinch of salt. Bring the mixture to a rolling boil. Cover the pan, reduce the heat to a sim and let the rice cook for 5 minutes. Then turn off the heat and let the rice cook for another 15 minutes.
- When the rice is done, add the cooked pineapple and its syrup and mix well. Add the cashew nut paste and saffron milk and mix again. Cover the pan and cook on a low heat for 2-3 minutes. Add the remaining ghee and let the rice absorb it all. Turn off the heat.
- Garnish with the fried cashew nuts and serve hot.
Notes
Disclaimer
The nutritional values are only indicative.
The sweet pulao sounds like a delicious treat! Sometimes people think that stay at home moms have nothing much to do, but then their days are equally packed especially when schools also be so relentless!
Thanks so much Rafee! Glad that you understand and empathize with stay at home mums! much love to you :*
Super dear.. easy recipe even kids will love this
Thanks a lot!
Hi Shireen.
Any particular reason why the rice shouldn’t be soaked? Does this recipe also call for water into he ratio 1:2 for cooking the rice?
Hi Neetha,
This is to prevent the rice from turning too mushy as we are adding the pineapple pieces and syrup once the rice is done. I have given the quantity of water to be used. It is more than 1:2 ratio. For 1/2 cup rice we need 1-1/4 cups of water