Muri Ghonto or Muro Ghonto is a traditional Bengali delicacy in which fried fish heads are cooked with Gobindobhog rice. It’s a spicy, delicious food that is served as a side dish with rice.
This dish is more popularly known as Muri Ghonto rather than Muro Ghonto, and the fun fact is Puffed Rice is Muri in Bengali. And we don’t cook Muri Ghonto with muri. On the other side, Muro is the Bengali word for Fish head. It’s just that the two words Muri and Ghonto are easy to pronounce together, and often sound like a single word MuriGhonto.
Gobindobhog, the fragrant rice variety of Bengal is the key ingredient of this recipe. Works as a base, the rice holds up all the aroma from the spices and fried fish heads when it’s cooked. Being sticky in nature, the rice works very well in the recipe, where the dish demands a thicker consistency.
In our home, Muri Ghonto was a favourite food that Ma would cook often for us. I’m sharing her recipe here, the way I learned it from her and love to cook for my family, and friends. 🙂
Different versions of Muri Ghonto, what really works?
The kind of Muri Ghonto I’ve grown up eating in my own family (cooked by Ma, Paternal Grandmother, Maternal Grandmother, Aunts, etc.), and at many functions especially on different Wedding day lunches, Birthday lunches, etc. was a rich, delicious, sticky mash of Rice, Potatoes, with a lot of broken pieces of fried fish heads.
The idea behind breaking the fried fish pieces vigorously while cooking Muri Ghonto was to infuse all the fishy substances, and juices inside the fish heads into the food, which helps Muri Ghonto to get its actual taste.
In fact, it’s a common process of incorporating fried fish heads in many Bengali dishes that calls for it as one of the main ingredients.
I’ve seen (Only On the Internet) people cooking Muri Ghonto without onion-garlic, and most importantly without breaking the fried fish head into it. In this version the Muri Ghonto appeared a lot like Pulao to me, Macher Matha die Polao to be more precise.
I enquired about this version to my Uncle in law, who runs a 30 years+ catering business in Kolkata, and he said that he never heard about something like that. We always cook a rich, spicy version of Muri Ghonto with onion-garlic, lots of broken pieces of fried Fish heads, sometimes we add fresh fish fats too which enhances the overall taste of the dish and people like it a lot, he mentioned.
What I understood is the version without onion-garlic might be preferred by the people who didn’t want to spice up Gobindobhog rice and was more settled with the subtle flavours from the whole spices to match up the delicate aroma of Gobindobhog. Maybe they don’t like to mess up the rice with fish bones but really like the strong flavour that a piece of the fried fish head would add to Gobindobhog rice. They must enjoy what they prefer while I mix hot, tasty my kind of Muri Ghonto with rice.
p.s. A reader emailed the above question, she had some confusion regarding the versions of Muri Ghonto. I tried to answer here as fairly as possible.
What can be the substitute for Gobindobhog rice?
If you don’t have Gobindobhog rice in your pantry, you may cook Muri Ghonto with Broken Basmati rice. The broken grains of Basmati would appear similar to Gobindobhog after cooking, but definitely, the aroma of Gobindobhog rice would be missing from the dish. So, if a major missing happens over Muri Ghonto, and it’s not possible to source Gobindobhog rice, then cook it with Broken Basmati rice.
Now, what if you don’t have Broken Basmati rice also. Add the regular Basmati rice to your food processor / mixer-grinder, blitz quickly (and carefully so that the grains don’t become a powder) to make them broken, and use as required.
Muri Ghonto / Fried fish head with Rice
A traditional Bengali delicacy where fried fish heads are cooked with Gobindobhog Rice. Rich in taste, Muri Ghonto is usually served as a main course dish.
Ingredients
- 1- Head of Rui or Katla fish
- ½ cup- Gobindobhog chal / Gobindobhog rice
- 1 large- Potato
- 2 medium-sized- Onion (chopped)
- 2 medium-sized- Tomato (chopped)
- 1½ tbsp - Ginger-Garlic paste
- 2- Bay leaf / Tej pata
- ½ tsp- Cumin seeds / Jeera
- 1- Whole dry red chilli (halved)
- 3-4- Green chilies (halved)
- Turmeric powder
- 1 tbsp- Cumin powder
- 1 tsp- Coriander powder
- 1 tsp- Kashmiri mirch powder or Red chilli powder
- 1 tbsp- Sugar
- ½ tsp- Garam masala powder
- Mustard oil
Instructions
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I used Rui (Rohu) fish head for this recipe, the fish weighed little more than 1 kg. At the time of Cutting the whole fish, the fish vendor would cut 1 whole fish head into two halves length-wise.
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Sprinkle salt and ½ tsp of turmeric powder on top of the fish head pieces, toss to coat, and keep aside.
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Wash gobindobhog chal 3-4 times, drain, and keep aside.
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Peel the potato and cut into cubes, wash and keep aside.
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Heat 1/2 cup oil in a kadai/deep frying pan.
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Fry the potato pieces until golden, remove and keep aside.
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Over medium heat start frying the fish heads, make sure that you covered the kadai with a lid by keeping a small gap so that the steam can escape. At the time of frying, Fish heads tend to splatter oil, so one needs to be careful at this step. Fry the pieces of fish head until they turn golden brown in colour. Remove and keep aside.
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After frying the fish heads there should be 4 tbsp oil in the kadai for further cooking. If not, add some at this stage.
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Temper with bay leaf, dry red chilli, and cumin seeds.
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Add chopped onion, and fry over medium heat until light brown in colour.
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Add ginger-garlic paste, tomatoes, green chilies, salt, cumin powder, coriander powder, and kashmiri mirch powder. mix and cook over medium heat for a few seconds. Now add a few tablespoons of water, and keep stirring the masala until it starts leaving oil. Adding water at this stage prevents the spices from burning, helps to dissolve the masala, and enhances the flavour.
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Add gobindobhog chal and potatoes. Mix well, over low heat cook for 5 minutes, stir in between.
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Now add 1 cup of hot water and fried pieces of fish head, mix well, cover, and cook until the rice grains are cooked through. All this over low heat.
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Keep stirring in between to prevent burning from the bottom of the pan.
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Break the pieces of fish head with the help of the spatula while you stir Muri Ghonto. Add splashes of hot water if you feel that the Ghonto is drying up too much. The consistency of Muri Ghonto should be on the thicker side not runny. Due to the starch present in the rice, Muri Ghonto starts to thicken a bit when it gets cooled.
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Add sugar and garam masala powder after the potatoes and rice get cooked. Mix gently, and cook for 2-3 minutes more uncovered. A little addition of sugar is necessary here, it doesn’t make the dish sweet, balances the flavours instead, and enhances the taste.
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Remove from the heat. Muri Ghonto is ready to serve now. Enjoy this hot with steamed rice.
Hi.. Love ur recipes. For thr Gobindhobhog rice, can Kali Jeera rice be substitued? Its also small grained and has a nuce smell.
Hi Kalpana! yes you can use Kali jeera rice. 🙂