The story of lentil would not be complete without mention of the eponymous “Kichdi”, the Indian rice and lentil combinations. I am sure there will be as many recipes of this preparation as the number of home cooks which clearly means that people love this easy to digest and easy to prepare recipe.

The writings of 15^th century suggest its origin in India when there were also the recipes containing meat as is found in offerings during the prayers of Goddess Kali. One of the varieties containing prawns is also very popular in Western India. Kichdi is also the source of inspiration of popular variation called “Kedgerre” which contains haddock and boiled egg and is found all across UK. Kichdi of the summer season are less thick than that of winter which contains more vegetables also to provide richness to counter the extremely cold nights.

Kichdi – the regional variations

Though it is popular both in India and Pakistan and in some parts of the world, it is worthwhile to look at some of the popular variations found elsewhere in different Indian states. The one served in Bengal is accompanied with Chokha (Potato hash), Begun Bhaja (Aubergine fry), chutney, papad and pickle. The gruel itself contains the seasonal vegetables like cauliflower, potato, green peas, spinach, spring onion etc. which make the entire preparation full of nutrition and taste. While it is rich delicacy found in the region of West Bengal and even fit to be offered during all the important occasions including festivals, in other parts of India it reincarnate itself as the food of the invalids and sick. Rice and lentil are cooked together until completely amalgamated and mushy and seasoned to appear as a very bland and ordinary cousin of the rich and suave Bengali delicacy.

Kichdi on its own as a main course is a very good source of carbohydrate, protein and vitamins if prepared with vegetables and essential minerals and at the same time very easy to digest.

Bengali Kechudi

Preparation time: 30minutes

Cooking time: 30minutes

Serves- 4-6

Ingredients

Tags: curries, chana, tandoori, tandoor, kulfi, dosa, handi, vindaloo, palak, indian curry

The word “keoti” means a medley of lentils here and hope is a recipe of interest for the readers
of sonzyskitchen blog. One of the cousins of this lentil recipe is called Hyderabadi Saat Nizami
which is a blend of seven lentils and host of tempering. The difficulty of this lentil has forced me
to think of its inclusion in the recipe section but if some of you reading the sonzyskitchen blog
are really interested, I will definitely send it across.
With its typical Hyderabadi flavor and mix of four lentils, dal keoti is a complex blend of lentils
where they complement each other rather than standing out. You can chose the lentil as per
your convenience and personal preference but we do outline the followings in the recipe
below.
Ingredients
¼ cup arhar dal (yellow lentil)
¼ cup masoor dal (red lentil)
¼ cup moong lentil (moong lentil without skin)
½ cup chana dal (Bengal gram)
2 medium red onion, sliced
1tsp ginger-garlic paste
¼ tsp turmeric powder
¼ tsp hot spice powder
2 fresh green chili, cut into four
2 tbsp lemon juice (dry mango powder as alternative)
2tbsp refined oil
Tempering
2 tbsp ghee
½ tsp mustard seeds
½ tsp cumin seeds
2 dry red chili
10-15 curry leaves
2-3 garlic, crushed
Method:
1. Soak the lentils separately for half an hour, boil chana dal for 10minutes or pressure
cook in enough water for 3-4minutes (2whistles).
2. Add rest of the lentils, add turmeric and salt and cook with enough water until tender.
Mash the lentil lightly.
3. Heat oil in a pan, sauté onions until light brown, 5-8minutes; add ginger-garlic paste and
sauté until raw aroma disappears. Next add lentil and some water if they are too thick.
4. Add hot spice powder and green chili and simmer for another 3-4minutes. Season with
salt and lemon juice and remove from heat.
5. For the tempering, heat ghee in a pan and add cumin seeds, mustard seeds, red chili,
curry leaves and garlic. When seeds start splattering and chili & garlic has become
aromatic, pour it onto the lentils and cover the container with a lid to trap the aroma
inside.
6. Serve hot with the Indian bread or rice of your choice.

Tags: chettinad, handi, chana, palak, gosht, idli, curries, roti, balti, dal

I am myself amazed to see the variety of preparation one would come across visiting different
states of India and also the different countries of the world. While we have seen few of the
lentil recipes in the previous blogs; this does not in any sense means that the lentil repertoire is
over. In some of the upcoming blogs the effort will be to continue to witness the various
application and nuances of lentil right from a standalone main course preparation to being an
important ingredient for a particular recipe. There will be few crossovers also between Indian
and Western preparations as some of the classical Western recipes are almost made in the
same way as their Indian counterpart except for little uniqueness.
The recipe that we have chosen for today is the savoury porridge of ground meat (one can
make with mutton, lamb or beef as the case may be) lentil and wheat. In some of the cases you
may come across some traditional recipes without the lentils; so do not be taken aback by the
various versions of Haleem as the idea is not to create confusion but enjoyment. Some of the
people have also developed the chicken and fish variety for people preferring the mild flavor
out of the dish.
This traditional porridge has its roots in Middle East but the one that we have included today is
the Hyderabadi (Southern state capital of Andhra Pradesh in India) variant which is a meal in
itself. During the month of Ramadan the aroma of this porridge will fill the lungs with the
craving of the same as most of the roadside eateries to popular restaurant will make their own
version to lure the customer on the occasion of Iftar, when the day long fasting comes to an
end and allows the people to break their fast.
Haleem (mutton, lentil and pounded wheat porridge)
Preparation time: 20-30minutes
Cooking time: 45-60minutes
Serves: 4-6
Ingredients
½ cup broken wheat
½ kg mutton (alternately lamb or beef)
¼ cup masoor dal (split red lentil)
¼ cup chana dal (split Bengal gram)
4 medium red onion
1tsp ginger-garlic paste
1/3 tsp haldi (turmeric)powder
1tsp red chili powder
1/3 tsp garam masala (hot spice) powder (see the notes on e-book available with sonzyskitchen)
1/3 cup Ghee (clarified butter)
¼ cup cooking oil
2-3green chilies (optional), chopped
1 cup full fat yogurt
Salt to taste
few mint leaves
2-3 tbsp fresh lemon juice
Method:
Soak the broken wheat overnight. Boil the wheat the following day until tender in a suitably large
pan, drain any extra water and cool the wheat down. Using a grinder, grind the moist wheat until
fine and set aside.
In a separate heavy bottom pan, heat oil and fry the onions until lightly caramelized. Remove half
the onion and keep aside for later use.
To the onion remaining in the pan, add ginger-garlic paste and fry for 2-3minutes until raw
aroma of the paste has disappeared. Add mutton, both the lentils, salt, chili powder and turmeric
and cook until the liquid released by lamb have almost evaporated.
In a bowl gently whisk the yogurt until smooth and add it to the mutton taking care to lower the
heat to avoid splitting the yogurt. Stir from time to time until oil starts floating on top. At this
stage add enough water to cover the mutton, cook until the meat is tender and most of the
water has been absorbed.
Remove the pan from the heat and cool down the mixture. Next, grind the mutton mixture until
fine.
Heat ghee in a suitably large heavy bottom pan, add the ground mutton and the wheat and cook
on medium heat for 8-10minutes until the specks of ghee start coming to the sides. Add hot
spice powder and lemon juice and stir to mix well. Check the seasoning and the consistency too,
the texture should be like a thick porridge.
Remove from heat and garnish with previously kept fried onion, chopped green chili and freshly
torn mint leaves. Serve hot.

Tags: indian curry, tandoor, dhokla, desi, tandoori, naan, kulfi, idli, sambhar, chicken

Just as the lentil series was threatening to take centre stage in the preceding blogs, I have
decided to change the topic a little just as to make a happy co-incidence with the election of US
president. The mood obviously is cheerful and optimistic and so wines will take the rightful
place during the celebrations centered on food and dining.
While some of the world cuisine goes very well with wine even to the extent of matching each
of the courses with appropriate grape variety and fizz. Same is not true of Indian food which we
are trying to investigate and explore today.
With the surge in economic activity and globalization of market, it is only a matter of time that
foreign businessmen and visitor will push the Indian dining experience towards acquiring a new
dimension in the form of pairing of Indian food with wine. One could very soon see the a bottle
of wine with the slightest excuse to go with popular Indian food like curries, kormas, biryanis
and tikkas. Some of the prominent Indian restaurant under the aegis of well known hotel
brands like Caridges, ITC and Hyatt have already started the initiative with guarded caution and
some other restaurants, within the hotel and standalone, would follow the suit to bring out the
culinary subtleties of food to complement the notes of wine.
Role of Sommelier
The surest way towards a better melody of curry and wine is to trust the knowledgeable
sommelier (the French term for wine waiter) but the overzealous waiter is equally bad. The
final decision is yours and your ability to afford the elixir of life. One should still be prepared to
question the selection of wine by the sommelier if all the notes are pointing to the same
direction without much informed choices. The idea is to develop the mutually complementing
symphony than the one overpowering other.
Most of the better Indian hotels and some of the up market Indian restaurants have tied up
with their foreign counterpart and arrange training and workshop for its staff to develop the
knowledge and skill. This is also a very good exercise in revenue maximization because of the
margin involved in wines and low labour cost implication in the long term. While the pairing is
still in the infancy in India, it is a common practice in western countries to plan the food around
wine, tapas like food being one of the examples.
Challenges of Pairing Indian food and wine
While it is easier to pair food with some of the cuisines of the world notable amongst them are
Italian, French, Mediterranean because it is a part of their day to day culture, it has always been
difficult to do so with most of the Asian cuisine as it was not a part of their culture. For example
drinking Sake is always very popular with Japanese cuisine. Indian food on other hand has never
been on the same side as that of their western counterparts.
The use of spices, the distractions of oil, the pungency, the inconsistency of recipes that one
wine working with the same food in one restaurant may not be the case with other restaurant.
Mushrooming of Indian restaurants all over the world with their own anglicized Indian recipes
has also not helped the cause. Exception to the rule will always be the delicate Indian
preparations the recipes of which are always guarded secrets of some select few in the India
kitchen.
The complementary notes:
While champagne will always be the natural choice to go with almost the endless variety of
food, the selection though will have to made between brut (dry) and sec (sweet).
Italian red wines like Chianti, Amarone, Barolo, or Barbaresco will go very well with chunkier
Indian food like lamb curry, tikkas and kormas. A good Riesling (white grape) from
Germany, France or Austria would do absolute justice to spicy and lemony food.
Some of the smarter people who do not wish to experience the pain of uncertainty of
choosing red or white would go with Rose wine (wine with the reddish tinge which renders a
pink hue to the liquid) to carry them through the entire meal experience.
Surprisingly the new world wines have charted the lesser known territories than their famed
old world counterparts. Young vintages work well with most of the food and if consuming
more than one wine during the meal experience, chose the lighter wines before full bodied
ones, dry wines before sweet one and lower alcohol wines before higher alcohol wines.
Always insist on tasting the wine before approving the entire bottle; for balance of flavour
work well when you know the spices and herbs and the floral notes of your wine.
We will try to explore more of it in the coming blogs with suggestions and alternatives. Unil
then just remember the popular Latin phrase “ In vino veritas” which means there lies the
truth in wine.

Tags: chana, handi, kebab, desi, roti, tikka masala, bhatura, curries, paneer, kulfi

While classifying Handi cooking through the annals of Indian culinary preparation has been the recent endeavour, the cooking vessels in ancient India were mostly Handi-like made from either clay or copper. The pots are typically round thick bottomed which tapers towards the mouth to capture the steam throughout the cooking process. The process is a bit lengthy because it dwells upon the principle of slow cooking to fully develop the flavor and aroma. While  the recipe of “handi dal” vary from place to place, as tracing this recipe through the culinary journey of past years does not yield much information, the widely acceptable lentils for Handi cooking are Arhar Dal, also known as Tur dal or yellow lentil and Whole urad dal, also known as Black lentil. We will try to recreate the recipe which is a close version of what most of the restaurants do while leaving the choice of lentil to you as per your convenience. Please remember that cooking Urad dal will take longer because it contains skin for this recipe and also because it releases its creaminess through slow cooking process as evident in Dal makhni.

Ingredients:
1 cup Yellow lentil (tur/ arhar dal)
2 tbsp groundnut oil
2 tbsp chopped ginger
2 tbsp chopped garlic
3 tbsp chopped onion
½ tsp turmeric powder
3 green chili, chopped
¼ cup chopped tomato
3 tbsp chopped coriander leaves
1 tbsp ghee/ white butter

Method:
Pick the lentils, wash in running water and keep soaked for 30minutes. This allows the lentil to hydrate and cook evenly. Place the washed lentil in handi with salt, turmeric and water (approximately 4 ½ cup), bring to boil, reduce the heat and remove the scum which surfaces on top.

Heat oil in pan, sauté until light brown, add chopped ginger and garlic and keep cooking until all the ingredients are of the same colour (light brown). Then add green chili, stir for a minute.
Add tomatoes and continue cooking until tomatoes are reduced to a pulp. Transfer the mixture to the lentil and stir. Continue cooking until lentils are cooked and of medium thick consistency.

Just before serving, stir in the ghee/ white butter and chopped coriander. Serve hot from the handi either with Indian bread or as an accompaniment for rice.

Bon Appetit !

- Kuntal

Tags: curries, naan, roti, chettinad, dal, paneer, handi, kebab, kulfi, tandoor