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What is dal (dahl)?
Dal is a staple food of India. This is equally loved in all parts of our country. It's a versatile dish and goes well with rice and roti. This is one of the easiest dishes to make for your main course. Whenever I feel lazy and not in the mood to cook anything special, my favorite is dal. Because it's healthy.
There are different varieties of lentils available in our country. Each lentil is different in taste. Also, the spices and tempering we add give it a different taste. Hing (asafoetida) and cumin seeds are essential in preparing dal recipes. Hing adds that extra flavor and aroma to dal or lentil soup, making it extra delicious. Plus they help in releasing the gas that are produced by eating pulses.
How To Make Dal or Lentil Soup?
It's very easy to make dal or lentil soup. The normal process of making dal includes the following steps.
I. Wash and soak dal for 10 - 15 minutes. This will reduce cooking time.
II. Boil it till they are cooked well. You may pressure cook it or use a saucepan or even an instant pot.
III. Add tempering of cumin seeds, hing, garlic, and aromatic spices to the cooked dal. Garnish with coriander leaves.
Easy and popular Indian dal recipes
1. Moong Masoor Dal
Moong masoor dal is one of the everyday dals I make for lunch or dinner recipes. Instead of making dals individually, I mix yellow moong dal and masoor dal. This tastes better than normal moong dal if cooked alone. This is the best way to add variation to our regular dal.
2. Lauki Chana Dal
Lauki chana dal is an excellent combination. It's really easy to prepare this dal in curried flavor. This is a simple dish yet delicious. The process is a little different than regular lentils.
3. Whole Masoor Dal
Whole masoor dal or brown lentils soup is one of my favorite dal till now. I love this dal anytime. It tastes equally great. This is cooked curried flavor.
4. Dal Tadka Dhaba Style
This is again a mixed dal made using three dal i.e tur dal or arhar dal, moong dal, and masoor dal. This is again tempered with spices twice to bring in that taste and flavor. Add hing and garlic to enhance the taste of dal. You can also add a smoky flavor to your dal.
5. Methi Moong Dal Fry
Methi moong dal fry is a dry sauteed dish with soaked moong dal and methi greens. Here, dal is just cooked till soft, unlike lentil soup. This is another healthy and yummy dish. Excellent food for diabetic patients also.
7. Hara Moong Dal
Hara moong dal is whole green gram lentils. These are harder, like a black gram or urad dal. So you must soak it for 2 hours or more to cook it faster and softly. It tastes great when cooked and curried. Saute with aromatic spices to make a complete dish.
8. Dal Makhani
Dal makhani is one of the most popular creamy dal recipe of Punjab and quite popular in North India. This dal is made with whole black gram lentils or sabut urad dal and kidney beans or rajma. But in my recipe, I've replaced urad dal with masoor dal.
9. Methi Dal
Methi dal is a mixture of lentils and fenugreek leaves. This is cooked like dal. You can either add chopped fenugreek leaves while pressure cooking the dal. Or saute leaves and mix with cooked dal. Top it with tempering of cumin seeds, garlic, and hing for best. Also, you may add spices to the dal.
10. Dal Palak
Dal palak is another quick dal dish with the added benefits of iron-rich spinach leaves. This is one of the easiest dals with a twist of spinach greens. Just add chopped spinach leaves to the cooker while cooking dal. Then, add tampering when cooked. If you have leftover dal, you can makeover that by adding sauteed spinach and garlic.
11. Moong Sprouts Curry
This is an easy-curried green gram lentil dish. Here, we use it in sprouted dal. To make sprouts, you need to soak it for 8 hours. Then strain them out, wrap them with a cloth or paper, and keep them in a dry and warm place to germinate. Or you can buy readymade sprouts to make curry.
12. Dal Amritsari / Langarwali Dal
This is one of the best dal I have ever tried. An authentic Punjabi dal recipe is a specialty that is served in Langar. This is a mixed dal (a mixture of kali urad dal + chana dal). Cooked and tempered with all aromatic spices this so flavourful. This is a must-try dal recipe, I will say.
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