Indian Lentil Pilaf

OH HAI! Remember me?! Yeah, it’s been awhile. I left my job of 5+ years, moved, and started a new job. All within 3 weeks! Cue mental breakdown (not really, but oh so close!).

I’m still settling in, still searching through boxes for all those scraps of recipes that I stashed wherever I had space while I was frantically packing. In the midst of the 3 days I had in between leaving my old job and moving day, I decided a really spectacular use of my free time would be to cut out all the recipes I wanted from the STACKS of food magazines I had accumulated over the years. I made this Indian salad from one of those recipes, and it comes from Vegetarian Times.

Indian Lentil Pilaf

What You’ll Need

• 1 cup lentils (I used greenish brown)
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 large carrots, diced
• 1 cup basmati rice
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 14.5 oz can fire-roasted diced tomatoes
• 1 cup low-sodium vegetable broth
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 ½ tsp garam masala
• 1 tbsp minced fresh ginger (or 1 tsp dried ground ginger)

What To Do

The name of my game when making this recipe was to explicitly NOT follow the directions.

The first thing the magazine tells you to do is rinse and sort the lentils. I summarily ignored this, and instead dumped them straight from the bag into 4 cups of water. Bring this to a boil, then turn the heat down to low and simmer for about 15 minutes. The recipe doesn’t say whether or not they should be covered while simmering. I left them uncovered and it was fine, so take your pick.

After 15 minutes of simmering, you’re supposed to drain the lentils and reserve ¾ cup of the cooking water, which is brown and looks like…well, use your imagination. I realized this mid-draining, so I only saved about ½ cup. The lentils then get stored in a bowl until you’re ready for them later.

While the lentils cook, dice your veggies and garlic. Add the oil and onion to your newly emptied pan and cook on medium for about 4 minutes.

I’m fairly sure the recipe intends for you to use a white/yellow onion because it mentions cooking until the onion turns translucent. I only had a mangy red onion, so that’s what I used, and it was fine.

After the onions cooked for 4 minutes longer than I intended because the damn carrots took longer to cut than I expected, I added the carrots and rice to the pot. My carrots were roughly hacked, not diced. Also, I didn’t have Basmati rice, so I used jasmine rice. TAKE THAT, RECIPE.

I stirred these around for about 3 or 4 minutes until the rice was nice and golden brown and toasted, and then I added the garam masala, ginger, and garlic. For those of you not familiar with it, garam masala is a spice blend comprised of coriander, clove, peppercorns, cumin, cardamom, nutmeg, and other spices, and commonly used in Indian cooking. It isn’t spicy, but its got a strong, distinctive flavor that, if you’ve ever eaten Indian food, you will recognize by taste. You can make your own based on the recipe here, or, like me, you may be able to find it in the international section of your grocery store (I scored mine at ShopRite, so it’s not that uncommon). Can you guess what I fudged at this step? Did you guess ginger? Bingo! I never buy fresh because the rest of the wonky looking tuber gets old and dried out in my fridge, so I guesstimated and subbed the 1 tbsp fresh ginger for 1 tsp ground ginger. That’s the benefit of making new things – you’ll never know how badly you screwed up the original if it tastes good at the end!

Once the spices had coated the contents of the pan, I dumped in the lentils, tomatoes, reserved poo water lentil cooking water, and veggie broth. I didn’t have veggie broth, so I used chicken broth. TAKE THAT, VEGETARIANS! And it wasn’t even the low-sodium version! TAKE THAT PART INFINITY, RECIPE! At this point, cover the pot, turn the heat way down to low, and simmer for 20-25 minutes, stirring occasionally.

 

After about 20 minutes, the rice will be nice and fluffy and most of the cooking liquid will be absorbed.

While it may appear as if there is a ghostly specter hovering over my lentils, it is only the copious amounts of steam that were pouring off of this bowl. In my opinion, this dish benefits greatly from a healthy dose of pepper and a little bit of salt, especially if you follow the recipe (HAHAHAHA) and use the low-sodium broth. Once seasoned, this is scrumptious. I served this when my mother-in-law came for lunch, and I was a little worried she wouldn’t like it because of the Indian flavors (not everyone shares my love of ethnic foods) but she devoured it. In fact, I think this could even use more spices than it calls for. Garam masala has an intense flavor profile but it’s slightly muted by veggies and other components of this dish, so I might use 2 or 2 ¼ tsp the next time around. Even though I served this as a side dish, you could also easily add some grilled tofu, chicken, shrimp, or fish to make this a main course. The recipe says this serves 6, and that’s being conservative. Like most salads, the more you let the flavors settle and meld the better, so you’ll enjoy any leftovers even more!

Marrakesh Vegetable Curry

This evening, guest blogger Allison and I got together for a good old-fashioned gabfest, which, when you get the two of us in a room, usually involves enough f-bombs to make a sailor blush. Since she’s been associated with this blog since the beginning, it was only fitting that we make a meal together which could be featured in a post.  After moving to New Jersey, which has quite a large Indian population, I’ve had a love affair with their food, especially curries.  This is a Moroccan twist on a traditional curry, thanks to the addition of orange juice, which provides a surprisingly delicious hint of citrusy sweetness.

What You’ll Need:

• 1 medium eggplant, cubed
  
• 1 green bell pepper, cubed
  
• 1 red bell pepper, cubed
  
• 1 medium yam or sweet potato, cubed
  
• 2 large carrots, chopped
  
• 1 medium zucchini, chopped
  
• 1 medium onion, diced
  
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
  
• 1 can garbanzo beans, rinsed and drained
  
• 2 tbsp brown raisins
  
• 1 cup orange juice
  
• 1 tbsp curry powder
  
• 1 tsp. turmeric
  
• 1 tsp cinnamon
  
• ½ tsp cayenne pepper
  
• 2 tsp salt
  
• 2 tsp. black pepper
  
• 4 tbsp olive oil

What To Do:

Cube the eggplant, green and red bell peppers, and sweet potato, dice the onion, mince the garlic, and chop the carrots.

 

Heat a Dutch oven over medium heat, then add 2 tbsp of the olive oil.  Saute the vegetables for 5 minutes.



While the vegetables are cooking, you can begin to make your spice mixture. Heat a small saucepan over medium heat.  Pour in the remaining 2 tbsp of olive oil, then add the cinnamon, curry powder, turmeric, salt, cayenne pepper, and black pepper. Use a spatula to evenly mix the spices, then remove them from the heat.

*Note: Not all spatulas are created equal.  I learned this the hard way, by causing a giant FAIL:



Yes, that is my spatula melted into two pieces.  I was wondering why it looked like a piece of pasta had fallen into my spice mix before I realized it was plastic, not dough.  As Benjamin Franklin once said, “Beer Silicone utensils (and bakeware!) are proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”  Indeed, Ben.  INDEED.

ANYWAYS.  Back to the curry: Pour your spice mix over the vegetables in the Dutch oven, which should be reducing in size thanks to the time spent simmering.  Add the orange juice, garbanzo beans, zucchini, and raisins.  Cover the pot, reduce the heat to low/simmer, and cook for 20 more minutes, stirring occasionally.



When I opened the pot, I was immediately assaulted with a garden-y, citrusy sensory overload.




The orange juice and spices cook down into a rich, thick sauce that coats the vegetables and was immediately absorbed into the brown rice I served this with. This is an extremely filling dish thanks to all the fiber and protein in the veggies, but none of us could stop ourselves from going back for seconds.  I recommend having some crusty bread or a pita on the side so that you can soak up all the sauce from your bowl once you’re done!  I’m excited to eat this tomorrow as leftovers, as I think it definitely has potential to be one of those dishes that is better after sitting overnight and letting the flavors meld together. You could easily throw in some spinach (mine was a little past its prime, so I was forced to exclude it), slivered almonds, or any other vegetables you might like. The raisins were an interesting inclusion that, in my opinion, could easily be doubled the next time around. I also think this would be excellent with a squeeze of lemon juice to enhance the hints of orange, or instead using a carrot-based juice.  There’s lots of room here for adaptation, and I strongly encourage playing around with the ingredients to suit your own tastes!  Regardless of what you use, you can’t go wrong with such a flavorful, healthy addition to your dinner menu.