Quest for best Hyderabadi Biryani

As I landed in Hyderabad, the foodie inside me woke up and my belly was carving for Hyderabadi biryani. It was raining heavily when I reached my brothers  place and was ready for the trail of Best Hyderabadi  Biryani.

Born and brought up in the region of awadh my heart always goes for Non-Vegetarian food and I was in Hyderabad whose delicacies Biryani and Haleem had risen and accomplished a cult status. Biryani in Hyderabad is known to be a lot spicy whereas Lucknowi Biryani is moreover like a Chicken pulav where emphasis is given more on Meat than Rice. Idris and Wahid Biryani are like Institutions for authentic Lucknowi Biryani. Bengali biryani is known for using Potatoes with meat while Kashmiri biryani uses asafetida as their speciality.

It was dusk when I started my journey. My first stop was Paradise in Hi-tech city Kondapur region. Paradise is one of the most famous eateries and has many eateries around Hyderabad. We ordered Full chicken biryani, it was served soon and as I couldn’t stop myself  more I grabbed my share and started my culinary journey.

Biryani in Hyderabad is served with quite less meat pieces and serves more rice. It may be because of Andhra belt where people prefer more rice in their meal. If a normal restaurant in Delhi or Mumbai serves Biryani in the ratio of 60:40 where 60 % is rice and 40 is Chicken. It gets reduced to 80:20 in Hyderabad.

Paradise biryani rice was quite less spicy than I had expected. There was nothing unique about it. The meat was cooked well but the aroma of meat was missing in the rice. It was not something you can call authentic. It may be the best biryani in past but definitely not now. It has changed its texture, may be to serve to larger audience from other parts of the country who don’t like spicy food. You can easily find taste of Paradise restaurant biryani in any cosmopolitan restaurant of your city. It was dark and I returned back for some more food which was waiting for me next day.

Next day I was in Char Minar area and many of friends had suggested for Hotel Shadab. Shadab is around 500m from Char Minar. It is two storey building where ground floor was open eatery. We headed upwards which is their AC restaurant. To fulfill Paradise disappointed, we ordered Mutton biryani. The ratio of biryani was same 80:20 for Rice and Mutton respectively. The biryani was quite spicy and their mutton pieces were cooked for long with the spices which had made it a lot tastier. The rice had traces of spices in it which had made it a lot for enjoyable. So, Shadab was a clear winner than the other one.

After visiting heritages places of Hyderabad, I was in Tolichowki where I headed towards another famous restaurant called Shah Ghouse. Shah Ghouse is considered pioneer in keeping authentic Hyderabadi biryani alive. In Shah Ghouse, we ordered Chicken biryani which was served beautifully with Mint leaves. The chicken was quite spicy and cooked perfectly because if you cook it for long, its pieces gets somewhat mashed up. But it was cooked well and due to that the rice was having a spicy taste. It was giving Biryani a sumptuous flavor. Overall the Biryani was something we can call authentic. It was a close competitor to Shadab but I will pick Shadab over it, probably because of my preference of Mutton over Chicken. But Shah Ghouse biryani was great and highly recommended. People sitting next to me suggested for Café Bahar and Bawarchi. But there was no time for that and I had to leave now.

So, good old Shadab came first in my food trail. Shah ghouse comes proudly second and Paradise will come third.

Do let me know if you had Biryani in any of these places or you want to suggest for some other options which we should try in your City.