An afternoon with Clara and Mr.Tiffany

Since I am home these days- my lunch is usually something extremely simple (like 2-minute maggi noodles withe some veg). On those rare occasions when I cook for lunch, it tend to be one-pot meals like this lauki dal or lauki-lentil soup.

Ingredients

1 medium lauki, cut into 1 inch cubes
1 cup washed toor dal or masoor dal (I used toor)
1/2 can (16oz) whole peeled tomatoes
1 tbsp minced ginger
2 green chilli pepper, slit in the middle
1 tbsp ghee/ oil
2 cups water/ veg broth
For tempering

2 tsp mustard seeds
2 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp fennel seeds
1 tbsp roasted crushed coriander powder
a pinch turmeric

1 tbsp shredded coconut for garnish

Method

In a pressure cooker, heat the ghee- add mustard seeds, once it starts to splatter add cumin, fennel, green chilli peppers- saute these for about 10sec

Add the tomatoes, lauki, ginger, turmeric and crushed coriander seeds- saute for about 4-5 minutes.

Add the dal and saute for another minute or two.

Add 2 cups of water, salt and pepper to taste- pressure cook the whole thing (I let mine go for about 5 whistles); you can do this even without the pressure cooker but it will take longer for the lentil to cook.

Once the pressure is all gone- open the lid, taste it- adjust for seasoning, check if everything is cooked- garnish with cilantro and coconut.

Serve hot with chappatis, rice or even as a soup!

Judgement

I love these multi-functional one pot meals- you eat 'em with rice/ rotis one day and the next day think 'em out and ladle some out in a big bowl- you got yourself some nice warm soup. I loved everything about this dal- a delicious light any-time meal. I enjoyed it while reading Susan Vreeland's Clara and Mr.Tiffany.

Did you know

Bottle gourd or calabash gourd (lauki) actively flowers at night- the nocturnal insects help in pollination

Comments

Gingerbread house

Oh the warm smell of spices is the hallmark of the holiday season and is the one thing we all love, don't we? GInger is definitely one spice that I love to include in my cooking/baking expeditions during this time of the year. So I was naturally happy to see that this month we were doing the gingerbread house for this month's challenge, well it was a fleeting moment anyway until I realized that it was yet another kitchen mishap. Consider this my 10th new recipe and the 3rd in Nupur's marathon . The December 2009 Daring Baker's challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi . They chose to challenge Daring Bakers' everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes. I used Y's recipe Ingredients 1 cup butter, room temperature 1 cup brown sugar, well packed 2 tablespoons cinnamon 4 teaspoons ground g...

From "The Baker's Daughter"

I love to read books and I love to cook- so "Cook the Books" event called out to me, what more can I say? When I didn't want to just sit around and catch up Breaking Bad episodes leading up to the finale yesterday, I threw these buns and some great vegan-gluten free strawberry cupcakes in the mix. The book chosen for the bi-monthly event Cook the Books is Sarah McCoy's "The Baker's Daughter "- a story about that intertwines food, history and a great narrative (toggles between WWII times in Germany and the present). I am just about a third done and so far like what I have read. I will post the review once I am done reading but in the meantime I leave you with these gorgeous buns that are traditionally made on St. Thomas Day that falls on Dec 21st (which also happens to be the shortest day). Thomasplitzchen Buns 1 cups all-purpose flour 1/4 tsp salt 1/4 cup butter 1/4 cup raw sugar 1 tsp baking powder 1/4 cup almond milk Filli...

Vadas- not your ordinary ones

I know, I know- I have been out of the blog-land, troubles of this world have me taken over you see and I need to fix it all for me to get back to y'all! Here is a gorgeous looking and perhaps amazingly tasty vada- it was my mum and my experiment all the way to fruition. Now I think kala or kabuli chana is the one of most underused forms of the fabacae family (compare to its ever popular cousin-chickpea). I love kabuli chana especially in what we call sundal from the Tam-land. If you have never tried sundal made of these babies, you must and I insist. But for now I settled for this minor experiment in the kitchen- kabuli chana vadas. Ingredients: Kabuli chana, 1 cup soaked overnight in 2 cups water 1/2 onion, chopped 1 tsp cumin seeds 1 tsp fennel seeds salt and ground red chilli powder to taste Oil for Method: Just like any dal vada- coarsely grind the softened chana (Note: this is not going to have a lot of binding capacity) Mix in the onions, salt, red chilli powder, cu...

Soulful Creations

Search This Blog