Albaloo Polo

Guide

• Prep time: 30 minutes
• Cooking time: 4 hours
• Difficulty: 3/5

Overview

Sour cherries (Albaloo) are a cousin of the more widely known cherries, native to Iran, the Near East and Eastern Europe. Loved as a standalone fruit in Iran especially by kids, they are also used in cooking and its syrup makes for a great refreshing drink on a hot summer day. In Eastern Europe they are mostly used in sweets such as pies, and in Belgium they are used to make a lambic.

Notes

• It’s best to make the sour cherry syrup the night before and have it settle overnight.
• You can find sour cherries at your local Iranian/Turkish grocery, generally pitted and frozen. They can be used in this form without thawing.
• This recipe uses boneless chicken breast and thigh, but Albaloo Polo can also be made with any meat, including minced beef formed into small meatballs. You can also skip the meat for a vegetarian dish.

Ingredients

serves 6

• 3 cups Basmati rice. Follow the Persian Rice recipe up to step 7.
• 150g butter or ghee
• 3tbsl olive oil
• 4–6 pieces of chicken breast or boneless chicken thigh fillet (or the equivalent amount of minced meat)
• 1kg frozen pitted sour cherries
• 500g caster sugar
• 50g slivered almond
• 50g slivered pistachios
• 2 tsp turmeric
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1 large brown onion
• 25g fresh ginger
• 1 Cup Saffron Water
• 3 litres water
• Salt & pepper to taste

Preparation

• Finely chop the onion, garlic & ginger
• Prepare the saffron water
• If using minced beef, roll them into small meatballs

Method

1. Albaloo Polo is served with Persian Polo. Follow that recipe until step 7, before filling the pot with half cooked rice.
2. Put the sour cherries and the sugar in a heavy-bottomed pot over high heat. Once boiling, lower the heat to medium and stir the sour cherries to ensure they are coated well with the sugar. Simmer for 15 to 20 minutes until the syrup thickens. Store the syrup at room temperature overnight.
3. Heat olive oil in a large non-stick frying pan over medium-high heat. Add the onion, garlic, ginger and turmeric. Stir frequently and quickly for two minutes until the onion is golden and the aroma of turmeric comes out.
4. Add the pieces of chicken to the pot, cover with water. Once simmering, reduce heat to medium and let it simmer for 1–2 hours. Add salt and pepper. At the end there should roughly be about 2 cups of “chicken jus” left in the pan.
5. Remove the pieces of chicken and tear/shred them to smaller pieces with hand.
6. Remove the sour cherries from the syrup. Set the syrup aside for now.
7. Make the rice according to its recipe. Follow that recipe up to step 7.
8. Pre-heat the oven to 150°C.
9. Layer the rice, the sour cherries and the chicken in a large oven-safe pot. I generally lay a layer of half cooked rice, follow it with a layer of chicken and top it with some sour cherries and reiterate until the end. Top the rice with slivered almonds in one corner of the pot, and finish with a some butter/ghee. Pour one cup of the “chicken jus” over the mixture. Cook for around 90 minutes in the oven.
10. About 80 minutes in, take a couple of spoonfuls of rice from the top of the pan as well as the slivered almonds which have been cooked in a corner.
11. In a small non-stick pot, melt the remaining butter. Reduce heat to low, add the pistachio slivers and some saffron water, the cooked spoonfuls of rice and the almond slivers, the remaining cup of chicken jus and 4 table spoons of the sour cherry syrup. Mix well to make the dressing.
12. Serve the dish on a large plate, topped with the dressing.

Postscript

• You can store the remaining sour cherry syrup and use it in baking or as ice cream topping.