Instant Pot Chicken Biryani

This Instant Pot Chicken Biryani has fragrant rice cooked with tender juicy chicken along with lots of warming spices and caramelized onions. This Indian chicken and rice dish is popular all over the world. This one-pot version made in a pressure cooker is easy to make even on busy weeknights in less than an hour.

This biryani has been on repeat in my house. My older daughter absolutely loves it. If you ask anyone to make biryani, all that would come to their mind is – first, the best, most flavorful rice dish, and then, it takes a long time to make and involves multiple steps.

This recipe is different than the traditional biryani. It is made as a one-pot dish in the pressure cooker, similar to my vegetable biryani. Yes, that’s right, I use just one pot to cook this biryani, and one bowl to marinate the chicken. And the biryani is just as flavorful with the complex flavors from mixing the rice, marinated chicken, caramelized onions, spices and saffron!

Jump to:

• What is Biryani?
• Why you will love this Instant Pot Biryani?
• How to make Chicken Biryani in Instant Pot?
• Tips to make Perfect Chicken Biryani

What is Biryani?

Biryani is one of the most popular Indian dish that is made with rice, meat and/or vegetables, and spices. Traditionally biryani has layers of meat and rice that are slow-cooked in a heavy bottom pot on the stovetop or in the oven. This is called Dum Biryani.

It is believed that Biryani originated in Persia and was brought to India by the Mughals. There are many variations of biryani in different regions of India. Hyderabadi, Chettinad, Malabar, Sindhi, are few of the variations you might hear about.

Why you will love this Instant Pot Biryani?

• One-pot: This biryani made in the instant does not require to cook chicken and rice separately and then layer it together. This means we make it all in one-pot, which means less mess and dishes. But mind you, it is just as flavorful as the authentic dum biryani.
• Takes less than an hour to make: This is including marination and pressure cooking time. So it is just 30 minutes of active effort to make this one-pot meal!

How to make Chicken Biryani in Instant Pot?

When I think of biryani, layers of meat and rice, topped with lots of caramelized or fried onions, come to my mind. And I did not want that to change even if I was making this one-pot version of my Chicken Biryani. So let me show you how I achieve that in the instant pot!

Let’s start with getting the ingredients ready for the biryani.   

Onions: In this recipe, I am caramelizing the onions by sautéing in the pot before adding the other ingredients. Traditionally, fried onions are also added to biryani. However remember that store-bough fried onions are not gluten-free. So feel free to fry them separately at home if you like. You can add some fried onions when marinating the chicken and some on top after cooking the biryani.

Chicken: I used boneless chicken thighs in this recipe. You can also use bone-in chicken when making biryani. Just pressure cook for 4 minutes before layering the rice. More details in notes.

Marinating the Chicken

We will marinate the chicken as that makes it much more tender and flavorful. Add the yogurt, spices, ginger, garlic paste, lime juice and mint, cilantro leaves. Mix all well and refrigerator for about 30 minutes.

At the same time, rinse the rice with water and soak it. I always use long grain basmati rice for biryani. The final dish looks amazing with the extra long cooked rice.

When you are ready to start cooking, soak the saffron strands in warm milk.

Caramelize the Onions

Start the instant pot on sauté mode and let it heat. Add ghee, and then the cashews, raisins and saute them for about a minute until they are lightly golden. Take out and reserve for later.

Then add in sliced onions and caramelize them.  This is the cooking step that takes some active effort, as you need to stir the onions frequently as they caramelize. Once caramelized, remove and keep aside half the onions. We will use these to garnish at the end.

Add the whole spices and saute for 30 seconds to release their aroma. Add in the marinated chicken and cook for 3 minutes stirring frequently.

Pressure Cook the Biryani

Make sure to deglaze the pot as you sauté the chicken. This is important to avoid the bur message. Then spread the chicken at the bottom of the pot.

Add in the rice and spread it over the chicken. Spread the saffron soaked in milk.

Then add the water, and pressure cook the biryani.

After pressure cooking, the rice should be well cooked and fluffy. They should not be mushy.

Garnish with the reserved caramelized onions, cashews and raisins. Garnish with chopped cilantro leaves.

Do not overmix the biryani in the pot.  When you scoop out the biryani from the pot, do from the bottom of the pot, so you get both chicken and rice with each scoop.

Enjoy this tasty Chicken Biryani with raita.

Tips to make Perfect Chicken Biryani

• Prep the ingredients: It helps to have all the ingredients ready before you start to cook biryani.
• Marinate the Chicken for at least 20 minutes. It helps to make the chicken tender and flavorful.
• Deglaze: Make sure to deglaze the pot well, so that you don’t get a burn message.
• Use high quality spices. If possible, make Garam Masala at home for the extra bold flavor. Here is my mom’s Garam Masala recipe.
• Use ghee to get the real flavor of biryani. I like to make ghee at home in the instant pot.
• Enjoy this biryani with a cooling raita such as this Cucumber Raita. And serve Sheer Khurma as a dessert.

Hope you enjoy this easy one-pot biryani. Do share how it turned out in comments or share a photo on instagram with #pipingpotcurry.