Dal & rice is amongst my all time favourites. In some form or the other its always been relished by me all my life. As a little kid, it used to be plain dal with ghee on rice. I still love that. But I need Ghee from a certain dairy in Cochin by name Udaya Dairy. The "neyyu" (ghee) there is out of this world. I'm not a big fan of ghee other than when it is from Udaya ! Mom(and the rest of my family in Cochin) buys butter from there and melts it into ghee and stores it. I love the black residue sorts at the bottom of the vessel. Its yummy !
Ok that was a drift (i'm known for taking long deviations whenever I talk ! Ashok hates that abt me ! I personally love that about myself..hehe)
So the dal and rice evolution. After the " Parippum chaadam" of childhood, it was "varan bhaat" during my days in Pune. A Maharashtrian speciality I would call it. Any time I would go to anyone's house, I would hope they would serve just this dal-rice. Varan Bhaat is so so yummy. And somewhere during college days, Jeera rice and dal fry also become a favourite. I remember, in our college campus there used to be a small restaurant by name "Sahiba". We would die for the jeera rice and dal fry they used to serve there. It was so awesome !
I had no idea whether Ashok would eat this. But my craving for dal rice was building up, and yesterday, I made Jeera Rice and tried out a kind of dal I hadnt made before. I didnt even think twice about trying it out coz I had assumed Ashok wouldnt eat it and this was made just for myself. I was making some other sabzi for him along with roti ! But even Ashok got carried away with the smell of the rice and dal and we ended up eating just that ! Me happy :)
Very easy to cook. Smells good. Tastes awesome. And leaves you with a feeling only simple foods can do to you !
Jeera Rice :
Heat up oil in a pan. Add lots of jeera. Make sure the oil is so hot that the jeera crackles immediately. I like the flavour that the instant crackling brings . Add it to washed basmati rice, add salt, add water and cook the rice.
The dal I made yday needs:
I cup dal - Toor dal, Moong dal, Chana dal - in any proportion you like. I took more than half the quantity of toor dal and some moong dal and a bit of chana dal. )
green chillies
A medium sized onion
ginger garlic paste
curry leaves
corriander leaves
coriander powder - 1tbsp
amchur powder - 1tsp
turmeric powder - 1 tsp
asafoetida - a pinch
ghee, jeera and mustard for tempering
some chopped coriander leaves
Add salt to the dals and cook in a pressure cooker. Heat a little oil in a pan and add green chillies, curry leaves and the onions. Once the onions are transparent, add the ginger garlic paste. Add the cooked dal and adjust the consistency by adding water if needed. Add asafoetida,coriander powder, turmeric powder and amchur powder. Let it boil for about 5 mins. In a separate pan, heat some ghee, add mustard and jeera.
pour it over the dal and garnish with chopped coriander leaves.
I added half a tomato too after frying the onions. Thats solely because I had half of it left after making a sandwich for Ashok in the morning. It tasted good with it, but i'm sure it would taste good without it too !
I also added a single dried red chilly as part of the tempering. Thats just because I like the look of it and so felt like adding it.
One more thing about the jeera rice I would want you to try if you love pop corn (eh? what relation ?) !! Leave the jeera rice to cook in an electric cooker and go out of the house for a walk or something. I went to pick up ashok from the rail station while this was cooking and when we returned the house was smelling so good ! I dont know if I was imagining it, but the house was smelling of pop corn ! and I love pop corn ! Which also lead to me picking up one of those pop corn bags and putting it into the microwave today. Yes, I just had to eat pop corn !
Ok that was a drift (i'm known for taking long deviations whenever I talk ! Ashok hates that abt me ! I personally love that about myself..hehe)
So the dal and rice evolution. After the " Parippum chaadam" of childhood, it was "varan bhaat" during my days in Pune. A Maharashtrian speciality I would call it. Any time I would go to anyone's house, I would hope they would serve just this dal-rice. Varan Bhaat is so so yummy. And somewhere during college days, Jeera rice and dal fry also become a favourite. I remember, in our college campus there used to be a small restaurant by name "Sahiba". We would die for the jeera rice and dal fry they used to serve there. It was so awesome !
I had no idea whether Ashok would eat this. But my craving for dal rice was building up, and yesterday, I made Jeera Rice and tried out a kind of dal I hadnt made before. I didnt even think twice about trying it out coz I had assumed Ashok wouldnt eat it and this was made just for myself. I was making some other sabzi for him along with roti ! But even Ashok got carried away with the smell of the rice and dal and we ended up eating just that ! Me happy :)
Very easy to cook. Smells good. Tastes awesome. And leaves you with a feeling only simple foods can do to you !
Jeera Rice :
Heat up oil in a pan. Add lots of jeera. Make sure the oil is so hot that the jeera crackles immediately. I like the flavour that the instant crackling brings . Add it to washed basmati rice, add salt, add water and cook the rice.
The dal I made yday needs:
I cup dal - Toor dal, Moong dal, Chana dal - in any proportion you like. I took more than half the quantity of toor dal and some moong dal and a bit of chana dal. )
green chillies
A medium sized onion
ginger garlic paste
curry leaves
corriander leaves
coriander powder - 1tbsp
amchur powder - 1tsp
turmeric powder - 1 tsp
asafoetida - a pinch
ghee, jeera and mustard for tempering
some chopped coriander leaves
Add salt to the dals and cook in a pressure cooker. Heat a little oil in a pan and add green chillies, curry leaves and the onions. Once the onions are transparent, add the ginger garlic paste. Add the cooked dal and adjust the consistency by adding water if needed. Add asafoetida,coriander powder, turmeric powder and amchur powder. Let it boil for about 5 mins. In a separate pan, heat some ghee, add mustard and jeera.
pour it over the dal and garnish with chopped coriander leaves.
I added half a tomato too after frying the onions. Thats solely because I had half of it left after making a sandwich for Ashok in the morning. It tasted good with it, but i'm sure it would taste good without it too !
I also added a single dried red chilly as part of the tempering. Thats just because I like the look of it and so felt like adding it.
One more thing about the jeera rice I would want you to try if you love pop corn (eh? what relation ?) !! Leave the jeera rice to cook in an electric cooker and go out of the house for a walk or something. I went to pick up ashok from the rail station while this was cooking and when we returned the house was smelling so good ! I dont know if I was imagining it, but the house was smelling of pop corn ! and I love pop corn ! Which also lead to me picking up one of those pop corn bags and putting it into the microwave today. Yes, I just had to eat pop corn !
