Monday 12 July 2010

one pan coconut dhal





Coconut dhal
This dhal is a staple in our house, it is the first recipe I wrote out for my darling daughter, it's cheap and easy to make and delicious. I included the ingredients when I sent a care package after she told me she'd been living on pot noodle alone, along with a savoy cabbage and a cake. 

Ingredients
Equipment needed
Orange split lentils
Water/stock
1 onion
1 carrot
Garlic
Curry powder
Fresh coriander
1” Creamed coconut
Salt, pepper
1 Tomato

Optional extras
Potatoes
or 1 apple

Wooden spoon
Medium sized saucepan
Mug
Chopping board
Knife
Peel onion and chop up roughly
Peel carrot and slice up
Take one or two cloves of garlic and crush under flat of knife and peel
Take 1 mugful of lentils, put in pan
Add two generous mugfuls of water or stock to pan
Bring to boil and simmer over low heat

You may see some scum start to bubble up – just remove it with the spoon – if you don’t everything will still taste fine

Add chopped onion and carrot
Add 1 tsp curry powder, pinch of salt, pepper and tomato
Cook over low heat until the lentils are getting soft, about 15m
Add creamed coconut, check that there is still enough liquid, if it’s getting dry add some more water and cook 5m more

Add chopped coriander leaves and stir through – check seasoning and add salt if needed

You might like to add a squeeze of lemon

Eat with rice or on its own.


If you want to make this into soup use three mugfuls of water.

My aunt cooks this and eats it with rice. Any leftovers she puts in a pot and then eats spread on toast as pate. Sounds a bit weird? I thought so, and ate it out of politeness, only to discover it is really delicious. She chops everything up much finer than me. Just a little tip. 

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