Bengal Red Lentils with Spices (Bengali Masar Dal)

Page 329

Cuisine: Indian | Course Type: Main Courses

(1 review)

Tags: dal red lentils Indian vegan

Recipe Review

My copy of this book opens to this recipe; the page is scribbled on and water-stained. I could live on this stuff ladled over rice. I've tried other dal recipes, but I always come back to this one. The recipe is vegan unless ghee is used. I've always used canola oil (vegetable oil is listed as an option in place of the ghee). It's plenty flavorful without the use of butter.

There are three basic steps involved in this recipe: cooking the red lentils; preparing onions, tomatoes, and ginger to flavor the lentils; and preparing the spice mixture to add near the end of lentil cooking. It's a fair amount of work, but well worth it. The flavorings in the spice mix are Bengal Panch Phoron (whole cumin, fennel, black mustard, fenugreek, and black onion seeds), bay leaf, red chili pods, and garlic. This combination is the reason I love this recipe. (I use the Panch Phoron mix to flavor sauteed greens, too.)

I recently converted this recipe for use in my slow cooker and it worked beautifully. I still prepared the flavoring and spice mixtures separately, but then I tossed them in the Crock-Pot with the uncooked lentil cooking ingredients. That way the work was done up front and there was no flurry of work at the end.

Sahni's instructions are easy to follow, but the lentil-cooking instructions refer to the basic legume preparation instructions on an earlier page. I know that doing it that way saves redundancy (and book pages), but I like to have all my instructions with the recipe. That's the main reason I've written in the book. (The other reason is to write the quantities for half a recipe, but I never cut it in half anymore. The leftovers are great and would last longer than they ever do in my fridge.)

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Comments

Queezle_Sister - 5th December 2011
I am definitely on the hunt for a good dal recipe. This is a really nicely detailed review, and the end result sounds awesome. One question - do you buy the mix pre-made, or fix it yourself? I'm certainly going to check the local libraries for that cookbook!

(edited 5th December 2011) 

NurseBobbi - 6th December 2011
Thanks! I make my own Panch Phoron mix. I keep all five ingredients on hand for other uses as well, so it's easy to throw together. I put a tablespoon of each whole seed in a small bowl, mix them up, and store them in a spice bottle. The black onion seed can be a bit tough to find in stores, but it's easy to find online. The other names for it include kalonji and charnushka seeds.

aj12754 - 6th December 2011
Great review -- I have never really tried to cook Indian food at all but your review makes me want to give it a shot.

NurseBobbi - 6th December 2011
Thanks for the comment! I learned to cook Indian food (primarily from this book) well before I ever had it in a restaurant. I knew I liked curried foods because I'd had them growing up and I knew that Indian cuisine offered a lot of vegetarian options. I picked up this book and one other then found an Indian grocery where I could buy ingredients. (This was before everything became available through E-commerce.) There's a lot to explore in Indian cuisine, and this book is a great introduction.

Leeka - 10th December 2011
Bobbi, the spice mix sound amazing. My mouth is watering and your review is excellent. Thanks for all the great information!

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