Mishti Polao

A sweet, rich Bengali-style polao with cashew and raisins

  • Cooking time
    1 hour, 30 mins
  • Calories
    520
    kcal
Recommended by
96.9
%
of
52048
viewers who rated this recipe on Youtube

Basanti polao or mishti polao is a sweet, ghee-laden rice dish made from fragrant gobindabhog or kalijeera rice, cashew nuts and raisins. This is the main rice dish of choice for any special occasion. Among the side dishes served with basanti pulao, kosha mangsho is the most popular. While there are many other kinds of polao made with different types of fruits, nuts, meat or fish, this one has become the most popular, featuring prominently on the menus of Bengali specialty restaurants such as Bhojohori Manna, Kewpie's, etc.

Use aged, non-parboiled (aatop) gobindobhog rice for this dish. New rice breaks very easily and will lead to a mash instead of perfectly cooked individual grains. We fry the rice before boiling it to enhance its flavours and break down the starch (which prevents rice from turning sticky). Also be careful of the amount of water you add. For 500 g rice, we’re using 1050 g water. However, as quality of rice varies widely, it is best that you reserve some of the water (5–10%) and add only if necessary.

This polao tastes best the next day, so plan accordingly. Resting allows all the flavours to mingle nicely. It also ensures that all the moisture is absorbed by rice grains, leading to fluffier polao.


Books in this recipe

No items found.
Like the work we do? Help keep this site ad-free by making a donation.
Donate

Ingredients

Serves
6 servings
  • 500 g aged gobindobhog rice
  • 100 g bengali-style ghee
  • 6 g ginger (finely chopped)
  • ½ tsp turmeric
  • 8 pcs cardamom
  • 3 pcs cinnamon
  • 8 pcs cloves
  • 3 pcs bay leaves
  • 20 g salt
  • 70 g sugar
  • 35 g cashew nuts
  • 35 g raisins
  • 6 pcs green chillies
  • 1050 g hot water

Method

  1. Wash and rinse rice, and leave it to air-dry over a strainer.
  2. Once dry, transfer it to a mixing bowl. Add to it finely chopped ginger, turmeric, cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, bay leaves, and Bengali-style ghee. Mix until rice grains are well coated with ghee and spices. Cover and rest for about an hour.
  3. Before you start cooking, set water to boil in a pot or in an electric kettle.
  4. Heat 5 g ghee in a kadai. Add the cashews and fry them until they are lightly coloured (about a minute). Now add the marinated rice. Fry it for about 6 minutes on medium until the rice takes on an opaque appearance. Add the raisins and fry for another 2 minutes.
  5. Add about 1050 g (±5%) hot water, along with the salt. The amount of water is important. Add too much and polao will become soggy, add too little and it may stick to the pan.
  6. Cover and cook on lowest possible heat for about 10 minutes.
  7. Add sugar and slit green chillies. Gently fold them into the rice, taking care to ensure that you don't break the grains of rice too much.
  8. Put the lid back on and steam for another 5 mins to let the sugar dissolve and any remaining moisture get absorbed into the rice. Turn off the heat and let it rest for some time before serving.

Recipe discussion

Did this recipe help you cook something that made you happy?

At Bong Eats, we are working to standardise Bengali recipes, and present them to the world in a way that anyone, anywhere will be able to cook Bengali food with confidence—even if they have never tasted it before. We want the world to know that there is Indian food beyond tikka masala.

A lot of time and money goes into creating precise recipes such as this one. We don't want to depend on advertisements that track our viewers' activities through third-party cookies; we do not want take sponsorship money from companies that don't make subpar products.

You can help us make this a sustainable venture that can employ talented local writers, editors, photographers, recipe-testers, and more. Donate to keep us going.

Make a One-time donation

Help us keep Bong Eats free and open for everyone by making a one-time contribution. You can donate as much as you want. No amount is too little.

Donate
Become a member ⭐️

Join to get access to a vibrant private community of people who full of people who love to cook, feed and eat. Get answers to your questions about recipes, techniques, where to find ingredients from fellow members. If you love cooking, this is the place for you.

Monthly LIVE cookalongs
Shiny new private forum
Adda after every video release
Personalised recommendations
✨ See Membership Perks ✨
OR
Art by Ritwika
A fun, private community for enthusiasts of Bengali food

We're building a community

With Bong Eats adda we are trying to create a quiet corner on the internet for people who love nothing more than cooking and feeding people. The focus is naturally on Bengali and South Asian food, but as anyone who has spent time with food and its history knows, everything in food is interconnected. Nowhere is this more true than in Bengal, the melting point of so many cultures of the world—home to the first "global cuisine", as food historian Pritha Sen puts it. If that sounds like just the place you have been looking for, come help us build this space together. We are just getting started.

Join now
Join our 2000+ strong community

🧣 Winter 🫛

Bakes & Roasts

Posted on
December 21, 2023
by
Bong Eats

Winter is here. It is time to get baking. Here are some ideas, both savoury and sweet.

Read More »

✨ What's new?

View all »

Bota-soho Begun Bhaja

Fried brinjal with stalk on

  • 20 mins
  • 104
    kcal
Viewers liked this
%

Peyajkoli Bhaja

A stir-fry with onion-blossom stalk

  • 40 mins
  • 160
    kcal
Viewers liked this
%

Bhetki Machher Jhol

With winter vegetables

  • 45 mins
  • 208
    kcal
Viewers liked this
%

Kacha Tetuler Tok

A light, green-tamarind chutney

  • 30 mins
  • 103
    kcal
Viewers liked this
%
See all New recipes »
More
rice
recipes
View all »

Mishti Polao

A sweet, rich Bengali-style polao with cashew and raisins

  • 1 hour, 30 mins
  • 520
    kcal

Bengali Vegetable Fried Rice

Easy-to-cook and nutritious, this fried rice is loaded with the goodness of fresh, seasonal veggies.

  • 60 minutes
  • 432
    kcal

Kolkata Mutton Biryani

Fragrant rice and soft mutton get together in this classic Calcutta biryani dish. Contains potatoes!

  • 4 hours
  • kcal
More
mutton
recipes
View all »

Pressure-cooker Mutton Curry

Bengali mutton curry, cooked in a pressure cooker, with tender pieces of meat and potatoes, and a light, flavourful broth.

  • 2 hours
  • 653
    kcal

Mangsher Ghugni

The well-loved east India snack ghugni (white chickpeas), cooked with chunks of mutton

  • 90 minutes
  • 294
    kcal

Mutton Burra Kabab

Double chops of mutton, marinated with spices and creamy yoghurt and roasted until juicy and smoky.

  • 1 hour
  • kcal