Tahdig

Ever since I heard of Tahdig, I’ve loved it, even though I’d never tried it. The idea of a plate of rice with a brittle, crackly crown appealed to me. It wasn’t until I was in Dubai with my friend Anissa Helou where she ordered a plate of just the crunchy shards of rice, I made a statement that it may have been the best thing I ever ate. There’s nothing wrong with speaking in superlatives, which is hard not to do about Tahdig. Enthusiasm is a good thing. It’s taken me over ten years to try making it at home, but I finally did. And I’m happy to report that now, I can have Tahdig whenever I want. And so can you.

I’ve always wanted to go to Iran. Those plans have been thwarted over the years by a variety of factors but friends who’ve been said the food was great and the people were lovely. Another friend who was a journalist based there for a few years also echoed that. One thing people have seen and learned in our lifetime is that the government of a country doesn’t necessarily reflect the feelings of the general population. Not everyone in France or the U.S. shares the same feelings projected by their governments, nor do people in other places.

But it’s hard for me not to like anything with rice. Technically the steamed rice dish is called Chelo and the crust is Tahdig so the finished dish I believe would be called Chelo Ba Tahdig. There are a number of variations on it, some which include lentils, dried cherries, and herbs (Sabzi Polo). Tahcheen is an oven-baked crisp rice dish that has chicken, Zereshk is made with tart barberries, and Albaloo Polow has sour cherries embedded in it.

Other variations include baking the rice over a sheet of flatbread, sliced potatoes, or pasta. If you’re anything like me, you want them all, but as much as I’m a friend of all carbs, I wanted to start with just rice. In the years I’ve spent years thinking about making this, I talked to Persian friends (and strangers) to gather intel. But it wasn’t until I saw it in Jew-ish by Jake Cohen (who deftly made it for us at his home) did I get the courage to give it a go myself.

According to Jake, and an Iranian friend who told me her mother did the same thing, one should use a cheap non-stick pan to make Tahdig. The flatter the bottom, the better. I didn’t have one so was planning to use my good-quality non-stick skillet. (Sorry cast-iron skillet aficionados. While they’re great for some things, they don’t have an affinity for rice, which I learned from a stuck-on experience when I tried to make fried rice in mine.)

But I was walking down the street and saw someone had put a cheap non-stick pot out on the sidewalk. With my typical 150% hygiene overdose – which Romain says I have une psychoses about (which is his opinion…) – I carefully picked the pan up and placed in it one of the shopping bags I usually carry and sanitized my hand. When I got home and took off my hazmat suit, I dropped the pot directly into the dishwasher and set the temperature to the Désenfecter mode, and let the machine do its thing.

Continuing to do the work, as they say, of understanding a dish before presenting it, I shared some of my results on social media, prompting helpful tips from Sabrina Ghayour, author of Persiana, who recommended scrunching up a circle of parchment paper and putting it in the pot before the rice and melted butter to keep it from sticking. That trick was echoed during an online class I took from Shayma Saadat. Others had a quibble about it, but I did try it and it works – but who knew “paper shaming” was a thing? (And I certainly hope those people don’t become cake-bakers because if you don’t like rounds of parchment, you’re going to be in for an unpleasant surprise.) But if something works for you, why not do it? It’s just a piece of paper.

So between Sabrina, Shayma, Samin, and Jake, whose husband is Persian, who got tips from his mother-in-law, I learned a lot in my several attempts. (I know I am 25% Syrian but when I get my ancestry DNA results back, they just might find out that I now have some Persian in me.) With all those celebrated cooks peering over my shoulder, including a Persian mother-in-law, I was in good hands. And while I didn’t adhere to one particular recipe, I learned and leaned on all of them for advice to come up with the one here.

A few tips:

The pan and stovetop: Over the years, I heard the same thing: “Use a cheap, non-stick skillet.” I tried that and found the Tahdig slipped out just fine but the cooking was uneven, which makes sense; most are flimsy and thin, so don’t have even heat distribution. So I went with using an All-Clad non-stick skillet, but I don’t want to go against the advice of a legion of Persian cooks, so give it a go with any non-stick skillet if you’d like. Samin Nosrat advises you can use a very well-seasoned cast-iron skillet but I have a bad memory of making fried rice in mine, and the scrape-up afterward, so I stuck with a non-stick skillet. (I used one of these.)

You’ll get better control on a gas stove. Some people have success making it in an electric rice cooker, which Shayma raised an eyebrow at. I haven’t made it on an electric stovetop but Sabrina Gayhour in her book Persiana says it can take up to twice as long to cook. So if using an electric stove, take that into account.

Parchment paper: For some reason, this caused a bit of a ruckus. I don’t think Carême had parchment paper when he was making genoise (sponge cake) in 1814. But boy, are we glad we have it now. If using a cast-iron skillet or a regular skillet (not non-stick) you may want to line the bottom with a round of parchment paper that’s been scrunched up, to make it easier to lay flat, then line the bottom of the pan with it before adding the melted butter in step #6. (To save washing too extra pans, you can melt the butter in the pan first then pour it out, line the pan with parchment, and pour it back in. Or melt it separately.) didn’t need the parchment paper in my non-stick skillet.

Saffron: Saffron is an ingredient I call “A Big Ask” in a recipe since it’s expensive. Like chocolate or garlic, however, there aren’t really any substitutes that match its unmistakable flavor. (If you’ve ever had carob, you know what I’m talking about.) Turmeric and Spigol are sometimes offered up as saffron substitutes, which will give you the color, but not the flavor. So if you can spring for the real deal, I strongly recommend it. The other ingredients are inexpensive so it’s the sole expense in the whole thing. But you can also leave it out. 

When buying saffron, avoid cheap saffron; due to the laborious way it’s cultivated, if it’s inexpensive it’s likely not of good quality, and not a good use of your money. Try to saffron from a reputable source. Iranian saffron is considered the best, although other countries produce saffron. The best saffron I’ve ever had was made by Sahar. Kalustyan’s, Vanilla Saffron Imports, and La Boîte are reputable sources, as is Diaspora. (Saffron is also grown and cultivated in California and on the rooftops of Paris.) There are some good tips for buying saffron here.

Butter and oil: Some cooks use all oil, some use just butter when making Tahdig. I found using all butter made it too rich-tasting for me so went with a combination of butter and oil. If you’re avoiding dairy, replace the butter in this recipe with additional oil.

Yogurt: The role of the yogurt is to help get a nice crust. (Some people add an egg yolk to the mix, too.) I used lowfat plain Greek-style yogurt but you could use regular whole milk or lowfat plain yogurt. While I haven’t tried it, Jake Cohen says in his cookbook that unflavored coconut yogurt works. If you don’t want to use it, just omit it.

Salt: “Salt to taste” in recipes drives some people nuts, but some people like a lot of salt and some like a little. I like food properly salted, which may mean something different to you than it does to me. When I took the online class with Shayma (which I highly recommend, especially if you’d like someone knowledgeable talking you through making the entire dish), she didn’t add any salt at all, since she was serving the rice with a savory stew. Samin, on the other hand, parboils the rice with “a generous 1/2 cup of kosher salt,” which she says drains away. (I didn’t try it.)  I don’t like food undersalted so I like the amount I gave in the recipe but feel free to add more or less.

The rice: You need to use basmati rice for tahdig. Shayma Saadat recommends Tilda rice, which is widely available. I made it with several other brands and had good results.

Checking the rice while it’s cooking: We’re often warned of dire consequences if we lift the lid to check on rice while it’s cooking. Cookbook author and cooking instructor Marion Cunningham use to rail about that, saying it didn’t make a difference. I can happily report that I’ve lifted the lid to check on rice while cooking and lived to tell about it. And I’ve never had any guests complain about “checked-on rice” either. Like grilling a steak, it’s better to check something while it’s cooking rather than ruining it.

To tell if it’s cooking nicely, or close to done, slide a flat utensil down between the rice and the bottom corner of the pan and lift it slightly, and carefully. It should be turning a nice golden brown on the edge of the underside. Unfortunately you can’t really see under the middle, but a golden brown edge will give you a clue as to how it’s progressing.

Once you’ve made this dish, you’ll get to know the heat of your stovetop and timing, so if it doesn’t come out perfect the first time, it’ll still taste wonderful, and you’ll know for next time that it may need a little more time, a little less heat, etc. That’s what I did, until I got it right.

Lastly, some say tahdig can take years to perfect. I’ve seen some amazing examples of Tahdig online but I got mine to where you see it in the pictures here on my third try. What I posted here is the recipe and technique that worked well for me. Due to a number of variables, everything from the material of the skillet to the type of rice, you may have different results. Like a relationship, take the information that you learned from the previous one and use it to make the next one better : )

And if your Tahdig doesn’t quite come out as planned, Samin Nosrat says: “…do what every Persian grandmother since the beginning of time has done: Scoop out the rice, chip out the tahdig in pieces with a spoon or metal spatula, and pretend you meant to do it this way.”