Kitchen frenzy

I woke up this morning on a desperate mission to make dumplings.  I made an attempt on Wednesday as an accompaniment to my salt fish and pumpkin...I used whole wheat flour and they were basically a disaster; my sister thought it was kind of an oxymoron to make a fried dumpling out of whole grain flour. Yesterday I bought a bag of unbleached flour (I couldn't bring myself to buy the chemically treated bleached/enriched stuff).

The fried dumplings at K& J restaurant are excellent - we get them with our breakfast...I called my husband's coworker and she told me to be sure to use butter and to deep fry for the best flavor.  This morning we were eating the salt fish and pumpkin so I took another stab at making the dumplings.  They came out tasty and somewhat flaky, like a biscuit...although the texture was not what I was going for, I think I will make them again.  I did 1 1/2 cups flour, 1 tsp each baking powder, salt, brown sugar, 1/4 cup milk...then my husband subtly challenged me to make a whole wheat version - same formula as the other but with only 3/4 cup flour.

After I made the dumplings, I thought about lunch - all that remains from the mirchi biryani is mostly rice...I was thinking I needed to add some chicken and plain rice to make it work - tandoori seemed like the best solution (this time I didn't get carried away with the spice).   Off I dashed to buy more chicken and yogurt; I also bought cashews, almonds, and pistachios because I planned to make kheer, but I forgot to buy more milk.  The chicken is in the marinater (trying to shorten the recommended marinading time) and I'm trying to decide if kheer really makes sense considering that we already have biryani rice...