Half-Assed Lamb Biryani

I had lamb leftover from my kabobs last night. I had read a recipe from Food and Wine, that looked like it was pretty good (Food and Wine recipe via cooking.com). I modified the recipe since I was using up leftovers and I wanted to include some more vegetables.

Ingredients

• 12 oz of lamb (cooked)
• 1 medium onion
• 1 carrot, minced (or about 5 baby carrots)
• 1/2 cup of diced peppers
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 3 cups of basmati rice (I cooked brown and white and mixed them)
• 1/4-1/2 cup of raisins
• 1/4 cup of chopped almonds
• 1/2 cup of yogurt

Seasonings

• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon of coriander
• salt, black pepper, turmeric, cloves, cinnamon, cayenne

I sauteed the onions, garlic, carrots, and diced peppers. I diced my leftover lamb into 3/4 inch cubes. I mixed cumin, coriander, and cayenne into the yogurt and added the lamb to this. After the vegetables were soft, I added the lamb mixture to the pan. It took about 5 minutes for the lamb to heat through. At this point I added cooked rice, raisins and almonds. I used Greek yogurt, so I had to thin the mixture down with some water. I added a dash of cinnamon, a dash of cloves, and a few dashes of turmeric. I adjusted the flavor with salt and pepper. I added a dash of lemon juice, as the Greek yogurt has a little different flavor than just plain yogurt. I really liked the flavor the raisins added, so I would have added more next time. I topped this with fresh cilantro.

It came out pretty good for the minimal amount of effort and the fact I was using up leftovers. It wasn't exactly pretty, so no pictures. I think this would also probably come out pretty good with tempeh rather than lamb, I'll have to try that in a future go-around.