Storing my research on how to make ordinary dal more tasty - thanks to all the many people who shared their tips! 😀 Really grateful for your generosity.
General Tips
So any saaru i mix tur and Moog dal along with vegetables i pressure cook.... Then mixer: sambar onions, chilli powder, sambar powder, little roasted channa, garlic and tamrind i grind and add to the cooker and boil with turmeric and salt, u can give tadka and close ...If u like hing in tadka add that, if u like slight sweet, bella. If u want ur vegetables crunchy and seperately u have to cook dal and later vegetables fry and dal mixture and masala mixture and tadka last. Tadka: i put just oil, mustard, red chili and hing
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Even gingelly or sesame oil for toor dal goes well...
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A bit of ghee on top after it has been served. Roasted jeera powder aids digestion.
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After dal is cooked, heat ghee or oil, add a big pinch of cumin seeds and lots of chopped garlic. If you all eat hot peppers then either add dry red chillies or chopped green chillies in this tadka. Once the garlic turns color, add this to dal
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I just do temper with mustard or cumin seeds, turmeric, hing, red chili powder or green chilies, garlic or garlic powder … ginger sometimes … make a big diff!
Lemon juice and curry leaves if available
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Just kasuri methi sprinkle at end. Just dry pudina sprinkle after you turn the Gas.
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my favourite simple dal tadka is panch phoron and garlic, with a bit of lime squeezed in at the end
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You can use hing as tempering with ghee... and some dried red chillis.
Another tempering which I like is, paanchforon, green chilli, turmeric, tomatoes and onion
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A few tips I've picked up -
* Use chopped garlic instead of minced, it's more flavourful and adds a bite
* replaced regular dried red chillies with the Tamilian variety that's sun dried in yogurt.. adds a nice tang
* A pinch of hing (asafoetida) to the regular cumin-garlic-chillies tadka instantly takes me home to my childhood. YMMV.
* If you don't like chunky tomatoes in dal (I don't) drop a whole tomato into the dal at the time of cooking. Before giving tadka, scoop it out, peel the skin (it will fall off easily) and mash the boiled tomato through a strainer adding the pulp directly into the dal so you get the flavour but not the chunks.
* Always use desi ghee for the most flavourful tadka.
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I make very simple recipe for both yellow moong / red masoor. In a pressure cooker, I heat oil, add some chopped ginger (green chillies optional as we don’t use chillies), some curry leaves, fry for a few seconds, add whole jeera, haldi, amchur. Then add some chopped tomato and mix. Add salt, add the washed & soaked dal, add water to cover and more, close the cooker and cook on high for a whistle, then on low for 2 whistles. Comes out nice and creamy. Garnish with coriander.
I also sometimes cook without the cooker, directly in saucepan or pot but it isn’t so creamy then.
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Add jeeravan masala to any dal, it elevates the taste.
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Add heeng to the tempering. Also, it is preferable to soak all dals for a few hours before cooking and discarding the soaking water, helps prevent bloating and dyspepsia.
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Add salt-cured, dried raw mango slices or fresh raw mango in the dal
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May be just me, but yellow butter adds a certain taste and creaminess that ghee doesn’t. You can add a blob of butter while finishing. Also, just a touch of lemon juice and toasted quasoori methi/ birista(deep fried onions).
One of my tricks with dal is to keep switching three ingredients -- coriander, curry leaves and garlic. I add one at a time, or two, then change the next day. I also alter the thickness of the dal from time to time. And at times I make spicy dal with onion garlic tomato ginger all fried well together. By playing around with these various options the dal tastes different each time.
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1. Add tomato / garlic / mint / coriander stalks for a variation
2. sometimes when our tastebuds are dead, I make a simple yellow dal with just masoor + a dash of moong (to give it creamu). no tadka except jeera, broken chillies and a generous pinch of hing tempered in ghee
3. If medically allowed, add sauteed methi / palak / moringa OR any seasonal greens to the dal and give simple tadka
4. We regularly make dal in summer esepcially with water based sabjis called THovve (in local kannada language) with veggies like lauki / mangalore cucumber / chayote squash/ ridge gourd/ turai (simple saute the veggies with cumin mustard tadka), add the cooked moong dal , salt, a dash of lime juice and a handful of grated coconut. no onion no garlic no tomato and this tastes yum with steamed rice / hot phulkas.
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Whatever kind of dal you're making, mix in a tsp - a tbsp (depending on the quantities) of karindi to it 5mins before you turn off the stove. Karindi is a thondekai (ivy gourd), and sometimes carrot pickle/ relish available at most North Karnataka stores. It has a soothing, palate cleansing, almost kombucha-ey flavor to it, just makes everything lovely.
I also stir in 'Ranjhaka' sometimes, which is a delicious, flavorful, pulpy red chilli paste. But if your husband has medical issues, then use at your discretion. It's rather strong..
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Parsee Moree Daar.
Boil any yellow or pink dal.
In d bagaar we use jeera, 1 green chilly,3cloves of garlic, curry putta.,salt n hing,huldee.
Sometimes use 1/4 of an onion, instead of garlic.
My sardarni- bff uses Rai,ginger, ,tomatoes,huldee n hing.
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Simplest recipe for daal .
Masoor daal ( pink). 1 katori
Moong daal 1 teaspoon
Soak for 15 -20 mins.
Add the following and pressure cook.
Tomato cut in 2 halves. No need to chop fine ,once cooked, its easy to remove the skin and mash along with the daal.
Pressure cook. And churn/ or mash well.
Add salt, curry masala/ jira powder/pepper powder/ rassam masala , about 3 cups water and boil on low flame till you get a nice aroma.
Tadka is optional.
Jeera, lasun,hing, haldi tadka in ghee.
Consistency of daal is watery more like rassam but if you want thick daal, reduce water qty.
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Moong Dal
Adding ginger grated on top just before taking it off flame for moong dal
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Using whole garam masla for moong dal for tadka...
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Bengali style yellow moong daal with lauki
Ingredients
Yellow moong-3/4 cup (soaked in hot water for an hour)
1 cup of cubed bottle gourd (lauki) or winter melon
1/3 cup of grated fresh coconut
1.5/2 inch ginger root peeled and grated or ground
1 tsp of whole spices (combo of black mustard and methi)
A smidge of hing
Salt and sugar to taste.
1 or 2 red chilis
Mustard oil to cook.
Heat oil in a pressure cooker. Add red chilis. When the chilis are smoking and almost burnt, turn off the heat. Add coconut. Sauté coconut over medium heat. Add seasoned (salt and sugar) lauki. Sauté until lauki has a char and coconut smells nutty. Add soaked daal. Add 3 times more water. Add hing and salt. Pressure cook up to 3 or 4 whistles. You want pliable lentil grains, but not completely mushy. Once the pressure releases, bring the daal back to a boil. Finish off with one more pinch of hing and the grated ginger. This daal has a very little back note of bitter. Instead of lauki, you can add chayote squash or leafy greens to it or fried karela fritters for a more robust bitter punch.
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Tuvar Dal
Toor daal only garlic and jeera tanka goes well
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I boil arhar with loads of garlic, whole chilli, haldi and salt and some desi ghee. Chopped palak is optional...but lovely. Tarka is desi ghee, whole jeera, red chilli .more garlic and hing. I love it. My friend from Agra who taught me this ( to complement the Bangali begun bhaja she learnt from me) thickens it with aata. I do not. This thick daal was so comforting in Delhi winters.
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One variation I’ve learnt is Sorakaya Pappu or Lauki Dal..
1 cup tur dal
1 cup cubed lauki
1 cup chopped tomatoes
Green chillies
Ginger
Curry leaves
Coriander leaves
Steam the lauki with salt and haldi and set aside.
In a cooker.. add oil/ ghee. Give tadka with rai, jeera, udad dal, hing , haldi, green chillies, curry leaves, ginger.
Add the soaked tur dal , chopped tomatoes, 2-3 cups water and cover.. 2 whistles shd be good.
Once the pressure settles, open the cooker and mix well,
Return to the stovetop, add the lauki, add salt and cook for 5-7 mins till the lauki mixes in ,
Add chopped coriander and serve over hot rice and ghee.
This is made on festival days in my house.. so no onions / garlic. Feel free to add if you like it that way,
This is great in the summers as it’s light on the tummy.
I also make Mango dal.. similar to the above recipe.. but skip the tomatoes and add 1/2 cup grated raw mango once the dal is cooked and boil for just a minute or two.
We make this for Ugadi when mangoes just make an appearance in the market.
Masoor Dal
Bengali style red masoor daal
Soak 3/4 cup of red masoor in hot water while you prep.
Finely Chop-
1 clove of garlic
1/2 of a shallot
1 Roma (medium sized) tomato
You will also need
2 green chilis or 2 dry red chilis
1/2 cup of finely chopped cilantro
Spices (you have a choice)
You can go with a combo of spices that we call panch (five) foron. These are Cumin, nigella, mustard, methi and fennel. You’ll need a tsp of this
OR you can go with 1 tsp of cumin seeds OR 1 tsp of nigella seeds.
Method. Heat 1 Tbsp of mustard or neutral oil in your pressure cooker. Add chilis/ and spices of your choice. Add a bit of turmeric powder. Add onion and garlic. Cook it down. Add salt and tomato. Add soaked daal. Add 3 to 4 times the amount of water to daal. Season the daal with salt. Pressure cook. In both prestige and Hawkins, I let two whistles escape. Let the pressure release naturally. Add chopped cilantro. We are aiming for a light/ brothy/ and well seasoned daal with a back note of heat.
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Simplest recipe for daal .
Masoor daal ( pink). 1 katori
Moong daal 1 teaspoon
Soak for 15 -20 mins.
Add the following and pressure cook.
Tomato cut in 2 halves. No need to chop fine ,once cooked, its easy to remove the skin and mash along with the daal.
Pressure cook. And churn/ or mash well.
Add salt, curry masala/ jira powder/pepper powder/ rassam masala , about 3 cups water and boil on low flame till you get a nice aroma.
Tadka is optional.
Jeera, lasun,hing, haldi tadka in ghee.
Consistency of daal is watery more like rassam but if you want thick daal, reduce water qty.
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Add turmeric, hing and pre dry roasted Panch Puran and Curry Leaves to the dhal as you boil it. Use a lot of Garlic. I don’t mince or slice it. Instead I smash a whole lot of Garlic Cloves, take the skin off and gently fry it in a little ghee, add it to the dhal. This releases the flavour and you get bits of soft garlic in the dhal. Lastly, I chop up two medium preserved lemons(deseeded) and add this to the dhal. You can add green mango instead. I add the salt at the very end, just to make sure the dhal is not too salty.
