Pulao for Stuffing Chicken

This Indian-inspired pulao is designed specifically as a stuffing for roast chicken. The rice cooks halfway in a curried broth with pineapple juice, raisins, and pistachios, then gets drained and packed inside the bird to finish cooking in the oven, absorbing all those roasted chicken juices as it goes.

Browning the curry powder until dark in the butter before adding liquid is a technique that transforms raw, dusty-tasting spice into something rich and toasty. Those extra minutes of frying bloom the spices and develop a deeper, more complex flavor than just dumping curry powder into the liquid.

Pineapple juice as part of the cooking liquid adds a tropical sweetness that balances the curry heat. Combined with plump raisins and bright green pistachios, this stuffing looks like a jeweled pilaf when you scoop it out of the bird.

Chef Tips

• Cook the rice only halfway. It finishes inside the chicken, and fully cooked rice turns to mush after another 45+ minutes in the oven.
• Strain off and save the cooking liquid. It’s concentrated, curried pineapple-chicken broth that makes a fantastic base for a sauce or gravy to serve alongside.
• Don’t pack the stuffing too tightly into the cavity. Rice expands as it finishes cooking, and tight packing means a dense, compressed center.
• This makes enough for one large chicken or two smaller birds. Scale down for a single small roaster.

Variations

• Lamb stuffing: Use this same pulao to stuff a boneless leg of lamb. The curry-pineapple combination pairs beautifully with lamb’s richness.
• Almond-apricot version: Swap the pistachios for slivered almonds and the raisins for chopped dried apricots for a different fruit-nut combination.