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| Chicken Haleem |
A colleague at work first mentioned Haleem and how delicious it is. A one-pot meal that is hearty and wholesome, I've been wanting to try it out in my kitchen for a long time. The main ingredient in the haleem mix is the wheat berry or little grains of wheat which are tinier than the wheat that is ground into flour.
As is my practice, I scoured the internet for haleem recipes, watched a few videos and came up with a recipe that is far from authentic, but delicious anyway. I mixed wheat berries with panch mishali dal or 5 different varieties of lentils. This consisted of red/masoor dal, split chickpeas/channa dal, white/urad dal, yellow/moong dal and yellow split peas/toor dal.
I used minced or ground chicken, 1 cup of wheat berries and a quarter cup each of the 5 types of lentils. The chicken was made into a keema curry and the lentils were first toasted in a dry skillet, cooled and blended to a fine powder. The chicken keema and haleem mix were then combined with 3 cups of water and simmered over medium-low heat until thickened.
Haleem reminds me of a rich version of khichuri in which rice is replaced with wheat berries. Delicious and nutritious, we had it for dinner with steamed rice and for lunch over a bed of rice noodles with several garnishes.
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| Serve with Garnishes |