Mung Dal and Cinnamon Rice

These were eaten separately, and were both quite good. The individual graininess of the mung dal was a nice change from yesterday's creamy masoor dal. The mung dal was earthy, and spicier than I had anticipated. The tastes blended very well together.

The Cinnamon Rice was a surprise. After looking at various ways of reanimating day-old rice, I pieced together some ideas and came up with this. I chose ground instead of whole spices to get a more intense taste. At first I was worried, but the result was great. The richness of the butter contrasted very well with the spiciness of the cinnamon and pepper, and the onions provided a nice background. In the end, a far more well-integrated dish than I had imagined.

Mung Dal

1 Tbsp butter
1/2 cup mung dal (whole mung beans in shell)
1/4 tsp mustard seeds
1/4 tsp cumin seeds
1/4 tsp turmeric
2 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp ground red pepper

Soak dal overnight.

Melt 1 Tbsp butter. Add mustard seeds and cumin. Cook 2-3 min. Add garlic and cook 3-4 min. Add 1 cup water, turmeric, pepper, and bring to a boil. Drain dal and add. Cook mostly covered 30 min. Stir occasionally, making sure not to mash the dal. Serve.

Cinnamon Rice

2 1/2 cups cooked rice
3 Tbsp butter
1 small onion diced very fine
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 Bay leaf
1/4-1/2 tsp ground mixed peppercorns
1 tsp salt
water

Melt butter. Add cinnamon, pepper, bay leaf. Cook 2-3 min. Add onion and cook until translucent. Remove bay leaf. Add rice and a little water to rehydrate. Cook approx 5 min stirring regularly until rice is warm and flavors are well mingled.

Masoor Dal with Onion Rice

First recipes--after my much anticipated trip to the Indian grocery store, I was ready to start cooking this morning. I returned last night with about $40 worth of dal (that's a lot of dal). My first dish was masoor dal (red lentils). As a side note, I had tried a continental masoor (brown lentils) dish last week, but I didn't have the appropriate ingredients. It was ok, but I knew a trip to the store was in order.

Here are the recipes:

Masoor Dal

2 cups masoor
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp salt
2 Tbsp butter
2 tsp ginger garlic paste
1 small onion chopped fairly small
1 tsp ground red pepper

Add turmeric and salt to 1 qt water and boil. Wash masoor and add to water. Cook uncovered 15 min. Add water as needed. The masoor will begin to dissolve. Add water as needed. The eventual goal is a creamy hummus-like consistency.

In a separate pan, melt butter and add ginger garlic paste. Cook several minutes and add onion. Cook until translucent. Add to masoor once masoor is done. Also add ground red pepper at this time. Cook and stir until well blended.


Onion rice
(modified from Indian Food Forever)

2 cups cooked rice
1 small onion chopped fairly fine
2 cloves garlic chopped fine
1 tsp black mustard seeds
1 Tbsp butter
juice from 1/2 lime
salt to taste

Melt butter and add mustard seeds. Cook 1 minute and add onion and garlic. Cook until onion is translucent. Add rice and lime juice. Stir until well blended. Remove from heat and salt to taste.


The results:

Wow! These were great. The dal was very good, and not overly flavored. It did need a lot of salt, however. The rice was wonderful. I have never added citrus to my rice before, and I really liked it. I was worried that the dal did not have any sour components. The lime in the rice provided this. I have been nibbling on this all day. Great first recipes.

Inception

As of late I have wanted to get back into cooking international dishes. In order to keep track of what I tried, what worked, and what didn't, I will be posting blog entries about each dish.