Persian Crispy Rice - Chelo with Tahdig - Recipe

May 17, 2010

Persian rice pilaf with a crispy crust - chelo with tahdig

Just about every culture that cooks rice has a crispy variation, whether it is the beloved crust on the bottom of the Spanish paella, fried rice in Chinese cuisine, or Indian bhel puri (a snack of crispy puffed rice, potatoes and chutney). For Persians, the basic basmati rice pilaf with a crust is called chelo, and the crust itself is tahdig.

The rest of this post, including the recipe, is guest posted over at my friend Alice's blog, Savory Sweet Life. Alice makes beautiful, homecooked meals and if you weren't hungry before you see her pictures, you will be afterwards! I'm excited to introduce our readers to each other, so please jump on over there, read the rest of the post, and check out her archives.

9 Comments

Healthy Foods Blog 2010-05-17 11:38:07

I think it's time to get hungry! Thank you for sharing the link. - Tera

Shakeology 2010-05-21 19:44:55

Thanks for the fantastic recipe, I'm going to give this a whirl over the weekend. Great photos by the way!

pj krause 2011-10-19 06:38:36

Now I know what's for dinner tonight--thanks!

Persian 2011-12-21 15:33:54

Mmm. Looks yummy. Hey, I was curious. You mentioned that almost every culture has its own crispy version. Do you know if this is also true in Japanese cuisine?

Michael Natkin 2011-12-22 10:08:12

Yep, there is onigiri, where rice is formed into a ball or other shape and grilled, which gives it somewhat of a crispy crust. And there are also Japanese versions of fried rice.

Jared Clifford 2012-07-26 07:55:48

Wow, that looks delicious!! I love crispy rice so very much!! I have been trying different ways to brown and crisp rice with a healthy twist!! Thanks for this one!

halleh 2013-02-22 01:44:53

hello i am a persian . well i enjoy this food too much . and we eat this food with KHORESHT . like korean people that eat kimchi with other foods . we have too mane khoresht's like 1- ghorme sabzie 2- gheymeh 3- badenjan 4- karafs and... if u like to have this khoresht's . i will be happy to send the recipe for every body on this web site .

Michael Natkin 2013-02-22 07:22:47

Hi Halleh - Thanks for your note; if you want to post some of you favorite khorest recipes as comments here I'm sure everyone would enjoy them, and maybe sometime I can work one up to be a full post on the site (with credit to you of course!).

halleh 2013-03-15 13:33:12

Hello . Thank you for your note . i am very excited about it . i will send you the recipes as soon as i finish translating them to the english .

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