National Dishes of the World

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Mandi
Photo: Donpapa, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

main dish

Mandi

مندي (mandi)

Chicken or lamb roasted in a deep pit oven above rice, which soaks up the dripping juices and a gentle smokiness.

Eaten in: Yemen

Prep
25 min
Cooking
1 h 20 min
Resting
1 h
Total
2 h 45 min
Servings
4

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About the dish

Mandi is a dish of rice and meat traditionally cooked in a deep clay tannour oven sunk into the ground. A pot of rice and broth sits at the bottom, and the seasoned meat – lamb or chicken – hangs above it, so its juices drip into the rice and everything takes on a gentle smoky aroma. The meat is very tender, and the rice fluffy and fragrant with cardamom, cloves and dried lime. It is served on large trays, scattered with fried onion, raisins or nuts, with a spicy tomato sauce. Mandi is now hugely popular across the region, including in restaurants built around their tannour ovens.

Main ingredients

  • chicken or lamb
  • basmati rice
  • spice blend
  • cardamom and cloves
  • dried lime
  • ghee

Yemen: It comes from the Hadramawt region and is now eaten throughout Yemen and the Arabian Peninsula.

More: Wikipedia (en)

Recipe

Mandi

https://foodmap.ominuvo.com/dish/mandi

Ingredients

4 servings

4 servings

Method

  1. Rub the chicken with the spice blend, salt and a spoonful of ghee and leave for an hour. Rinse the rice and soak it in cold water for 30 minutes.

  2. Chop the onion and soften it in the remaining ghee in a wide ovenproof dish. Add the whole spices, pierced dried limes, water and salt and bring to the boil.

  3. Stir in the drained rice and set a rack over the dish with the chicken on it, skin side up.

  4. Seal everything tightly with foil and bake at 190°C for about 1 hour, until the rice has absorbed the liquid and the chicken is cooked. Remove the foil and roast for 15 more minutes to brown the skin.

  5. Light the charcoal over a gas flame until glowing, set it in a small foil cup on top of the rice, pour the oil over it and immediately cover the dish tightly for 5 minutes.

  6. Remove the charcoal, turn the rice out onto a platter and arrange the chicken on top. Serve with a spicy tomato sauce.

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