Who doesn’t like family gatherings with lots of food enough to feed even the neighbors? This is how Virginia Nazareth grew up as her grandmother would make a special meal – biryani. This is an Indian mixed rice dish flavored with fragment species. The Nazareth family is also well-known for including mutton or lamb in this recipe.

The Lamb Biryani Recipe

Virginia remembers how the family would have the biryani with raita, salad, cooked veggies, and sorpotel. That was enough to feed the whole family and then pack the guests with the leftovers to take home.

Speaking of family, Virginia’s grandmother had six children who each had three kids of their own. In other words, family gatherings in the Nazareth family are rather large. Cooking for a big crowd is a rather pleasing experience, and Virginia decided to share her grandmother’s recipe with an even bigger crowd – the members of Reddit.

Nazareth’s Biryani Recipe Got Internet Famous on Reddit

Sharing the recipe with the Redditors, Virginia explained that it’s at least 80 years old. She kept the recipe as authentic as possible. However, she added a paprika touch inspired by her mother’s taste.

Nazareth’s grandmother was born in Goa, India, and moved to Sindh (currently in Pakistan but was still India at that time) in her early twenties. This is the reason her biryani includes potatoes as Sindhi biryani differs from that of other regions.

The original recipe calls for a lot of labor-intense ingredients as Virginia recalls. She also shared that when she and her husband plated it for the first time, they thought they’d never make it again. However, after they actually tasted it, they were already eager to try it a second time.

The process includes creating a spice paste from coriander, cumin, and fresh mint. Other ingredients include four pounds of rice, cubing for pounds of lamb, and layering the veggies, rice, and lamb into an enormous dish.

Paying Tribute to Her Family and Grandmother

Virginia really shared her grandmother’s biryani recipe to pay tribute to the whole family. Family and love should be shared in her words, and this is exactly what her grandmother would do if she were alive today – “baking and cooking nonstop and looking for people to feed.”

Hate crimes against the Asian community is on a steady rise since the last few months. Such criminal incidents targeting Asians comes against the backdrop of the pandemic. The same has led to many Asian and non-Asian celebrities (Sandra Oh, Rihanna and Gemma Chan to name a few) to come forward and talk against this hatred and flatten the growing Asian hate curve. It has led to the birth of hashtags such as #StopAsianHate – with many brands chiming in their voice and support for the cause. One such brand is Peggy Li.

Peggy is an established jewelry designer with her jewelry seen in popular television shows such as Kim’s Convenience, Riverdale, Dead to Me, Jane the Virgin and CW’s Arrow. An Asian American herself, Li has created two fundraising designs for the larger cause. Find out more about it below.

Thoughtful Designs

Peggy has created two minimalistic yet super-impactful jewelry designs as a part of a larger narrative. One can either choose between Fortune Cookie Necklace and Year of The Ox Necklace to demonstrate their solidarity with the AAPI community.

Necklaces You Should Checkout

The Fortune Cookie Necklace measures ¼’’ in height and is available in sterling silver or a 14k gold plated charm on a 14 k gold chain. In contrast, The Year of Ox Necklace measures ½’’ in width. The latter is a symbol of resilience, possessing vast reserves of strength – emblematic of staying courageous in testing times.

Making a Statement Through Jewelry

Li, being an Asian herself, is fully committed to the cause without any intentions of seeking out business opportunities. The sales proceeds from both the necklaces are funded in various ongoing third party programs and initiatives designed and devised to curb Asian hate. Having spent a large share of her childhood in Chinatown communities of San Francisco and Oakland, Li can relate to the pain and difficulties faced by them as a result of anti-Asian sentiment.