Toor Dal

Toor dal (yellow lentil) is a famous Indian lentil with a homely and down to earth feel. The meal is normally prepared parallelly to short grain or long grain rice (the basmati variety) and is sometimes served with a side vegetable dish. The dish is relatively simple to make and if you are looking for something to help you when you are a bit under the weather or just stay a little warm, then you are in the right place!

Preparation steps

• Start off by taking some toor dal in a 250 ml measuring cup as shown below. As this lentil is a staple in a typical Indian household, you should have no trouble finding it in an Indian store near you.

• Wash the dal 3 times in a vessel in order to clean it thoroughly. In this case, I used my pressure cooker itself as it would be needed in order to cook the dal. I understand that this may not be available in your kitchen. If you find yourself in such a situation, I recommend using Masoor dal (red split lentil) which does not need a cooker in order to cook and is even a little tastier. I have touched up on this point ahead 🙂

• Meanwhile take two tomatoes and cut them roughly while removing the seeds. I had also kept some garlic cloves ready but did not use them in the end.

• Once cleaned, pour about 2.25 cups of water, introduce some turmeric and the tomatoes for the single cup of the dal taken. Then simply place your pressure cooker with its whistle on the stove. Keep the flame on medium as this ensures that the dal will cook evenly.
• Once the mixture starts boiling the whistle will release the pressure of the steam. Note that I use a traditional pressure cooker. Whichever one you may is fine 🙂 After the first whistle arrives, bring the heat to a low setting and let the dal cook for about 15 minutes. More whistles may happen in the meantime and that is okay.

• The final result of the cooked dal (without any spices) is as under. As you can see its well cooked with a little amount of water still present. This is good because the dish would then have the right amount of thickness and consistency to it. The dal grains are still a little visible and can be mashed using a simple egg beater if you wish.

• Now start preparing all the spices needed for adding flavor to the boiled and cooked mixture. I forgot to use the Asafetida powder when I was preparing this dish.

• Take a pan, pour the required quantity of sunflower oil and once hot, introduce the mustard seeds. The seeds need to start sputtering and release their fragrance. Once this is done put some curry leaves, garlic cloves and asafetida powder, if available. These only need to cook together for about 10 seconds.

• Bring the flame to a low once again and add the spices. Its crucial that you monitor the heat at this stage otherwise the spices will get burnt which will not be ideal for the final finish. These only need to cook for about 10 seconds on a low flame.

• Immediately pour the dal mixture present in the pressure cooker. It will simmer for a bit and then slowly mix the dal to ensure that the spices, oil and water get evenly distributed. Cook for roughly 10 minutes on a medium flame and then drop in some freshly cut coriander leaves. You are done! 🙂

Final pointers

• Use Masoor dal (red split lentils) if you do not have a pressure cooker. These need to be washed as with the yellow lentils, soaked for 15 minutes and then cooked in an open pot until they get soft. Because, the red split ones are thinner, open pot cooking works very well for them. See the picture below 🙂 All the other steps are the same as for the yellow lentils.

• Certain recipes include the Indian green chilis which can be spicy for people outside of India and therefore, I have skipped them. Nevertheless, feel free to add them after the mustard seeds are done if you wish to experiment with them. The Indian dried red chili can also be used and lends a slightly different flavor.
• Serve the dal with normal short grain or long grained rice based on your preferences.

As always comments are highly appreciated! Thank you and happy cooking 🙂