Prepping & Marinating

• Measure, wash and soak basmati rice. Let it soak for 30 minutes before cooking.

• Cut Fish fillets into 3/4 inch or medium size pieces.
• In a medium sized bowl, beat yogurt to get a smooth consistency. Then add all ingredients for marination and mix well.
• Add the fish pieces to this marinade. Mix well so that the marinade coats fish well. Let it marinate for 30 minutes.
• In the meantime, in a pan, heat ghee. Add sliced onions and fry until they turn golden brown or caramelized. Remove from pan and drain into a bounty to remove excess ghee.
• While the onions are caramelizing, wash, chop and keep aside cilantro & mint.
• Prep the nuts. If you'd like, you can add some raisins as well.
• Heat milk and saffron in a small bowl. For convenience, use a microwave. Else, heat milk in a small saucepan and add saffron. Bring it to a boil and remove from heat. Keep aside.

Cooking the fish

• 30 minutes into marination, pan fry fish pieces in the same pan that was used to caramelize onions. You can add a tbsp of cooking oil if desired or use left over ghee.
• Only pan fry the fish pieces. 2 minutes each side is good enough. Keep aside the marination gravy. This will be used later.

Cooking Rice

• In a large pot, bring around 5 cups of water to a boil. When the water is hot, add the spices listed under 'For Rice'. Get it to a boil and add rice.
• Gently stir with a spoon occasionally while the rice is cooking. Don't reduce the flame.
• Just when the rice is about 75% cooked (the rice grains should have a slight bite to them), drain the rice in a colander. Gently fluff and keep aside.

Layering & cooking

• While the rice is cooking, preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius or 360 degree Fahrenheit.
• Grease a thick bottom oven safe pan/ disposable aluminum tray with ghee or cooking oil.
• Let's begin layering. Layer half of pan fried fish and sprinkle half of chopped mint, cilantro and nuts. Next layer half of the 75% cooked rice.
• Sprinkle half of caramelized onions, green chili, saffron milk, almonds and cashew nuts.
• Layer the remaining pan fried fish.
• Layer the remaining rice and sprinkle the remaining fried onions, green chili, cilantro, mint, saffron milk, almonds and cashew nuts. Also add the left over marination gravy.
• You can make 2 layers of fish and rice or 4 layers. Or more than that (depends on the depth of the container and the quantity you are cooking). But the top most layer should always be that of rice.
• Seal the container with an aluminum foil. Bake the biryani for 20-25 minutes.
• Remove from oven. Serve hot and delicately flavored biryani with 'Dahi Ki Chutney' and 'Mirchi Ka Salan'. Enjoy!