Vegan Lentil Dahl

One day, while I was cleaning out the pantry, I came across a random bag of lentils. I pondered, why do I have this, and what should I do with this? I didn't want to do the old standby of lentil soup, so I dug around on the internet and found this very simple vegan recipe for spicy lentil dhaal. I like that it is vegan (I am definitely not vegan, but I can appreciate the healthfulness of vegan cuisine) and doesn't use ghee, the clarified butter sometimes used in Indian cooking. I have now made this dish several times, and not always with red lentils, but with whatever color lentils I have on hand.

Admittedly, the red lentils seems to come out the creamiest, but a version using the plain old brown lentils you find in any old grocery store is still pretty good.

Yum - red lentils. (Yes, I have a pastel pink mini colander.)

Chop up some garlic, ginger and onions, and saute the aromatics in sesame oil. Trust the recipe, don't substitute in regular vegetable oil - the sesame oil is much more fragrant and has a nuttier flavor.

While it might seem like a pain in the ass to gather all the spices, once you have them in your pantry, you can explore all sorts of different uses for them and make interesting new recipes! Here's a little cardamom pod about to be squashed in my mini-mortar and pestle set. Note the looming pestle of death, ready to extract the seeds.

Once you take out the little black seeds and grind them up, the smell is amazing.

A bunch of spices, being prepared to be dumped into the pot with the lentils: cumin, cinnamon, coriander, tumeric, cayenne...

If you don't like spicy foods, go easy on the cayenne. Me, I love spicy food, so I even add a little extra sometimes.

Everyone into the pool with the sauteed onions, ginger and garlic! Uh, no camera shots of this step - did I mention it is a little hard to hold ingredients, heavy camera with lens and stir all at the same time?

Then at the very end, add your tomato paste. Gives the dahl even more of a lovely color!

I love getting the tomato paste that comes in a tube. It is a little pricier than getting the little cans of tomato paste, but I often find that if I use the little can, I have a lot of the paste leftover and it just ends up going to waste because I don't use it in time before grossness sets in. With the tube, I use what I need, cap it and put it away for next time.

We usually eat this dahl with warm naan bread that we get a Trader Joe's. Now, there's another West Coast thing that I love. TJ's has made it out to the East Coast now, so for those East Coasters, get thee to TJ's. They have all sorts of interesting healthy items, all at very reasonable prices.