14/04/2026
We send our greetings to all our Residents who are celebrating this special day.
Warmest wishes for the Tamil New Year, and to the Sikhs, Malayalees, Bengalis and our other Indian communities in Singapore who celebrate major festivities today and tomorrow.
What’s there not to like about Briyani? Seen today as the quintessential Indian dish, but your race, religion or culture doesn’t matter.
And if, like me, you have gone off beef, there’s a choice of the ever-popular chicken briyani, or mutton, lamb or seafood briyani. Slow-cooked, so the rice is infused with the flavour of the meats and numerous spices.
My own choice these days is vegetable briyani – like in the photo, where jackfruit, still chewy, takes the place of meat. It’s in fact a fast growing, healthy and environmentally friendly choice* in India, where biryani is the most popular food order.
Briyani is also another example of a dish that crossed geographies and cultures. It is widely believed to have originated in Persia (today’s Iran), before making its way to the Indian subcontinent centuries ago. Each region in India then evolved their own, famous styles of biryani.
Southeast Asia has put its own riffs on the dish. Nasi briyani in Singapore and Malaysia is usually served with achar (pickled vegetables) or cooked slices of pineapple, and a generous amount of dalcha (lentil curry). In Indonesia, expect more coconut milk and local spices.
*Vegetable briyani is often made with a short-grain rice from Tamil Nadu – called ‘seeraga samba’. It is gluten-free and has a lower glycaemic index than many long grained white rice varieties. It is also grown with less water, which is getting to be in seriously short supply in rice-growing regions.
Photo shows vegetable biryani, using jackfruit, at Podi & Poriyal in Little India.
Photo by Daras Singh/President's Office
