Vegetable Rice (Pulav)
January 20th, 2007 filed under Rice, Vegan
Vegetable pulav is a mix of spicy vegetables with rice. This is a great dish for lunch. If you are not in the mood to prepare a big meal, use vegetable pulav as a one-dish meal. Serve with yogurt, pickle, papadam or chutney.
Serves 2 to 4.
Ingredients:
- For rice
- 1 cup basmati or long grain rice
- 2 cups water
- 2 tablespoons oil
- 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 teaspoon salt
- For vegetables
- 3 tablespoons oil
- 1 teaspoon cumin seeds (jeera)
- 1 medium sized potato, chopped into 1/2″ cubes
- 1 carrot, chopped
- 1 cup cauliflower, cut into small pieces
- 1 cup frozen green peas
- 1/2 red bell pepper, chopped
- 2 long sliced green peppers
- 1 teaspoon grated ginger
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon garam masala
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- For garnish:
- 2 tablespoons minced cilantro
Preparing the rice:
- Heat the oil in a saucepan. Test the oil by adding one cumin seed; if seed cracks right away oil is ready.
- Add cumin seeds after cumin seeds crack add bay leaves and stir for few seconds.
- Next add the rice. Stir-fry for 2 minutes.
- Add water and salt, bring to a boil and turn the heat to low. Cover the pan.
- Cook about 15 minutes, or until the rice is tender and the water has evaporated. Turn off the heat and fluff the rice with a fork.
Preparing the vegetables:
- Use a frying pan to cook the vegetables. Add the vegetables in steps, the vegetables that need the most time to cook are added first and the vegetables that need the least time will be added last.
- Heat the oil in frying pan. Test the heat by adding one cumin seed to the oil; if it cracks right away oil is ready.
- Add cumin seeds after cumin seeds crack, add potatoes, stir-fry them for about 2 minutes.
- Add cauliflower and carrots. Let them cook for about another 3 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Next add green peas, bell pepper, ginger and green chilies. Let the vegetables cook for a few minutes till vegetables are tender. Turn off the heat.
- Add garam masala and lemon juice.
- Next gently fold the rice into the vegetables. Transfer to a serving dish and garnish the rice dish with cilantro.
I’m very new to your website but I’m loving it. I made pulav yesterday and we’ve never enjoyed pulav so much before it was great thank you. First time my husband said you beat my cooking so that’s a great compliment
How long should the rice soak? Thank you.
Jackie,
about 15 minutes.
why do you add lemon juice to the pulao
Hi Aunty,
Thank you for this recipe. Its very easy and tasy to prepare after coming from job and my hus likes it very much..thank you so much
Anu
Thank you so much, this was very interesting. I was actually born in Madrid (I’m not telling you what year though!) but moved around europe and lastly settled in Britain when I was 5. I dont remember an awful lot of the few years I was in spain, but the delicious smell of spanish food always seems to get me going or something. Funny, how I dont remember anything except the smells,isn’t it! I even found a whole internet site dedicated to spanish recipes, which gave me great delight and thought I ought to share. Anyway, thank you again. I’ll get my son to add your website to my rss app…
Hi Manjula ji! I tried today a variation of your recipe because I had all the required vegetables but they were frozen and I wanted to use fresh. So instead of cauliflower I used zuchinni and instead of peas I used mushrooms. My result of course is different from your but still the dish was veeeery goood! However I think three tablespoons of oil for a cup of rice is a little too much, next time I will use only two. You are doing a great job here, thank you very much!
I am having trouble understanding the difference between vegetable biryani and vegetable pulav. I know they are both spicy vegetables with rice. What makes them different?
Thank you!
Nicole
Biriyani is essentially a little bit more sourish in taste because of youghurt which is a key ingredient! Biriyani is more of a special dish because we take the trouble of adding fragrance and color( like saffron and orange color sometimes) ..you don’t break out the frills with veg.pulaov
Atleast this is what its like in my house:)
The most imp thing is…in the words of http://ramkicooks.blogspot.com/2009/07/1001-easy-biryanis.html
“A Biriyani is in fact a rice sandwich, where layers of meat / veggies served sandwiched between layers of rice. It is interesting to see that many rules for a good sandwich also apply to a biriyani.
1. It should be perfectly cooked, but not soggy.
2. It should have multiple layers
3. It can have vegetable / meat fillings
4. It should be assembled in a colourful, artistic way, with all layers clearly visible – the brilliant white of the rice layer, with splashes of saffron, the brown/ red/ orange meat layer, and the whitish brown layer where these layers mix.
In addition, the golden rule in a biriyani is that no two grains of rice should stick together.
Many confuse between Biryani and another middle eastern rice recipe, the pilaf. Remember that a Biryani is a sandwich at heart, whereas a pilaf ( pulao) is not. A pulao is a one pot dish where rice gets cooked in a meat / vegetable broth. (Interestingly the Spanish paella, is a variation of the pulao and the Cajun / creole Jambalaya is also another version of the pulao) But it does not get assembled in layers like a Biryani.”
Great advice and info Niloufer!
Thanks a bunch!
Terrific site, where did you come up with the information in this piece of writing? I’m happy I found it though, ill be checking back soon to see what other articles you have.
Hi Aunty,
I dont eat potatoes and carrots being a Jain so want to know the exact number of cups of veggies to be used.Could u please tell me ?
Thanks in advance.
-Bhavika
Hi Manjula aunty,
I tried the Vege pulav recipe today. I didnt have all the veges at home and so I used frozen veges that I had. It turned out awesome. It is very simple as well.
Malini