5 Minute Moong Dal With Red Lentils and Browned Onions

Not the cooking time (5 minutes), but the writing time.

and, GO!

Okay, so this is a simple recipe for lentils. I basically had no other protein in my house and had to figure out something nourishing and comforting. For me, that means dal. I have no idea what kind of dal I actually used. I only used one even though the recipe called for two. It was black and a small lentil but if it was actually moong dal like the recipe wanted, I have no clue. Still, the recipe worked fine and my tummy was happy, and will yours, probably. All tummies are different, after all.

1 cup dal (some kind of lentil - red, black...specifically moong dal is called for, so if you can find it)
1 cup split red lentils
5 cups water
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 1/4 tsp salt
2 tbsp oil
pinch of ground asafetida
1 tsp fennel seeds
4 dried hot red chilies
1 small onion, very finely sliced into rings

Five minutes are up, I lose. I'll be back!

Okay, I'm back.

Moong dal, continued:

So I love fried onions. I hate onion rings even though they're almost the same thing but not breaded. You get this intense onion flavour that you either love or hate, but your tongue gets to go swimming in oil since you essentially just deep-fryed the slices. I think I first got into them when someone I knew told me their favourite dish was biryani and they tried it at every restaurant they could find, the best in downtown Toronto being found at Quick Pita on College for awhile. That didn't include Little India on Gerrard Street, but for convenience sake, Quick Pita was pretty good, apparently. Anyway, they're the garnish for this dish, which makes it a little more gourmet than simple boiled lentils.

First, wash the lentils. Put them in a bowl and wash them like rice. Actually, you need to start the rice about the same time (or before) you start washing the dal. That way the rice can soak and the grains will stay separate.

After a few changes of water to clean the dal, drain them and put them in a big pot. Add the water and turmeric. Turmeric will take away some of the effect of beans on your digestive system ("Beans, beans, good for the heart..." etc.). Bring the dal to a simmer (don't let it boil over) and then reduce the heat, cover it but leave it "slightly ajar" (this is apparently the traditional way to cook lentils - partially covered) and let the dal simmer softly for about 45 minutes. It shouldn't completely fall apart, but it should be tender. If you don't use moong dal and red lentils, whatever you use may cook faster or slower. If you don't use lentils at all but you use beans instead, make sure you soak the beans overnight and then cook them. Lentils are split (like "split peas") and don't need to be soaked. They're the convenient legume, but it's all relative. 45 minutes is not exactly quick cooking. Unlike rice, you're allowed to stir the dal a few times while it's cooking, and when it's done you season right away with the salt, stir, and then leave covered over low heat if you don't have the next step already done while you were waiting for the lentils to cook.

All that's left is to heat the oil over high heat, and do some very quick, hot sauté-ing. This makes lots of noise, and looks really flashy, so if you have people over, they can watch in the kitchen and you'll look like a culinary superstar. Take that, Nigella.

When the oil's hot put in the pinch of asafetida, (be carefully of hot flying oil) count to 1 (yes, 1) and then add the fennel seeds. Count to 3 and then add the red chiles. Count to 4 and then add the onions. What happened to 2? Shouldn't you have to count to 2 somewhere? Then it would be called 1-2-3-4 frying. 1-3-4 is not as catchy, but traditional foods are not meant to be catchy, I suppose. They're probably just meant to be practical. So skip counting to 2. It's an unnecessary number and a waste of 2 seconds of your life.

Stir, stir, stir and reduce the heat to medium-high until the onions are very brown and crisp. They'll look like you really over-cooked them, but they'll taste great. If they really start to look like they're blackening or burning, turn the heat down a little more. Now pour everything from the frying pan into the dal that's set on low waiting for you patiently. You want to pour all the oil in too, not just the onions and spices. There may not be a whole lot of oil leftover, but you really need the fat of the oil in this to help digest the lentils. Otherwise there's about zero grams of fat and you'll never feel full and you'll have an awful time digesting, despite your use of turmeric. Actually I even drained the lentils after cooking them (before adding the salt) and added more turmeric, just to get more starch out of the water that had come out of the lentils while they cooked.

Serve on a bed of beautiful basmati rice that you've maybe even timed correctly to have finished just now and pour a little bit of yogurt on the side of the plate. The dairy actually helps turn the rice and lentils into a full protein! Ah, the miracles of Indian cooking. So sorry vegans, your protein will be incomplete, but your tongue will be happy from beautiful fried onions and oil.

Chana Dal (Yellow Split Peas): Madhur Jaffrey's "Indian Cooking"

Chana dal is not the same as yellow split peas, despite my misleading title.

Yes, split peas are very similar and they're a fine substitution, but no, they're not the same. Rube's, in St. Lawrence Market, did not have Chana Dal. I could have asked where else to find it, I could have hunted it down, but it really didn't seem worth it since Rube is such a nice guy, his prices are amazing, and nobody who was going to eat the dal would either notice the difference or care.

Dal is also one of the easiest meals to throw together, and makes a great dinner with just a bit of rice and some yogurt or milk. Apparently you need a grain (rice or bread) and dairy (yogurt) to turn the lentils into a complete protein. So traditionally in India it would be eaten with naan or rice, and a glass of buttermilk. Also, traditionally, it would be cooked with a spice that aids digestion - turmeric, ginger or asafetida - to avoid the similar effects of chili on Superbowl Sunday. Dals are denser than soup, with a thick puréed texture, but without the excess work of puréeing. It has a nutty flavour and a chewy texture that depends on the lentil used. The word 'dal' refers to different kinds of split lentils, and the dal recipes in Madhur Jaffrey's cookbook Indian Cooking are included in the section called 'pulses'. Whole peas or beans (chickpeas, kidney beans) are also pulses, but only split peas and split lentils (the kinds of legumes you don't need to pre-soak overnight) are considered to be dals.

Enough history. The point is that this is delicious because Rube gave me great yellow split peas.

I took 3 cups of yellow split peas, rinsed them in a colander, and picked out any that didn't look good. Rube saved me a lot of trouble here, since they were pre-picked-over. Then I brought the split peas to a boil with 10 cups of water. A layer of scum rises to the surface, and it's important to skim it off before adding a teaspoon of turmeric and 4 slices of unpeeled ginger. The size of the slices don't matter too much, as the spices certainly won't overwhelm the dal. Then I reduced the heat to low and simmered the split peas for an hour. The recipe says an hour and a half but they were turning into mush, and I'm a firm believer that there should be no mush. It's like over-cooked pasta - al dente would have been better. Oh, and I had to remember to stir during the last half hour to prevent any sticking of the dal to the bottom of the pot. As much as I don't like mush dal, I also don't like burnt dal. Then I took it off the heat and added 1 1/2 tsp of salt (there's not a whole lot of sharp flavour in the dish, so salt is essential. You could go as high as 2 tsp...) and 1/2 tsp garam masala (again, err on the side of excess). Then I took out of the ginger slices. No point having them sitting around in there waiting to not get eaten.

The nice thing about this dish is it's basically done. The last step can wait until just before you're ready to serve. It's also a very cool presentation for guests. To finish the dal, heat 2 tbsp of oil (or ghee or butter. Some people disagree on the use of butter here, but I'm not 100% convinced it's not fine. Ghee is just clarified butter. I'll save you the rant on clarified butter and its traditional reason for use...as well as why I think it's a little ridiculous that it's still used. Leave a comment/question below if you're curious) on medium in a frying pan. When it's hot put in a tsp of whole cumin seeds, and 4 cloves of chopped garlic a few seconds later. The only reason I can see to do these two additions separately is to ensure that the cumin seed gets coated in oil, but there's more than enough oil, so it seems ridiculous. Sorry, Ms. Jaffrey. In fact, the recipe says to use 6 tbsp of oil, and since there's no fat in the rest of the dish, this wouldn't be absolutely awful, but I was serving it with a high-fat chicken dish, and I wanted to keep the rest of the fat content down.

Once the garlic browned I added a teaspoon of chili flakes. I always think I could add more heat in these dishes, but it's up to you. I garnished the dish with fresh hot green chilis, so if I wanted more heat myself, I could just munch on those. The second the red chili flakes touched the pan I removed the skillet from the heat and poured the whole contents into the dal pot (If the flakes start cooking they'll take over the air of the kitchen and you won't be able to breathe. Coughing on chili flakes is not so fun...). Then you just stir. So the whole spice mixture in the frying pan is a quick seasoning for the simply-boiled dal. The oil and spices get distributed throughout the whole pot, giving flavour where there was little. Other recipes in the 'pulse' section of the cookbook follow similar formulas, with results that taste a whole lot like traditional Canadian lentil soup or stew, with a few extra spices or some heat, but this recipe is my favourite because of the flavour of the split peas. They were nutty, a little sweet, a little spicy, and went really well with the rice and yogurt. Funny, that...

Again, brilliant, practical and delicious Indian food traditions.