Dal Tadka is a popular Indian dish where cooked lentils are tempered with oil/ghee and spices. It isn’t a South Indian dish. However, dal tadka is a favorite for one and all. Dal/Lentils is one of our staple foods and there are many different varieties available in our country, the popular ones being Dal Tadka and Dal Makhani.
Dal Tadka is usually made with yellow lentils. I usually take a mix of Split Bengal Gram(Chana Dal) and Split Red Gram(Tuvar Dal), in the ratio 1:2. You can use only one of these instead. The preparation can be divided into two stages.
- cook the dal
- tempering
Dal Tadka goes well with rotis, chapatis and rice, be it steamed rice or jeera rice.
Ingredients
- 1 cup toor dal,
- 1/2 cup chana dal
- 2 cups water
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon turmeric
- 3 tablespoons oil or ghee
- 1 cup tomatoes chopped
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 1/2 teaspoon mustard seeds
- 1/8 teaspoon asafetida
- 2 whole dry red chili
- 2 bay leaf
- 1 tablespoon green chili, finely chopped
- 2 teaspoons ginger, finely chopped
- 2 teaspoons garlic, finely chopped
- 2 tablespoons coriander leaves, finely chopped (hara dhania)
- 1 teaspoon red chilli powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon mango powder (amchoor)
- 1/4 teaspoon garam masala
Instructions
- Wash and soak dal for an hour so that it soaks up the water and puff up.
- Strain dal and add into into a pressure cooker.
- Add salt, turmeric and 2-1/2 cups water. Cook on medium high heat for 3-4 whistles/
- Wait till the steam has escaped before opening the pressure cooker.
- Dal should be soft and should have the consistency of thick soup.
- Heat the ghee/oil in a saucepan. Add cumin seeds, and mustard seeds, asafoetida, whole red chili. After it splutters, add bay leaves, green chili, ginger, garlic and chili powder. Stir for a few seconds.
- Add tomatoes, salt and sugar stir and cook until tomatoes are tender and mushy.
- Add cilantro and garam masala cook for about one minute.
- Pour the seasoning over dal. Mix it well and cook for another minute.
- Serve hot.
Written for Day 7 of #NaBloPoMo by BlogHer
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Again, simple everyday dish that most people wouldn’t want to write about! This blog is a must read for anyone learning to cook! Awesome resource!! 🙂
Make my mouth water!Dal Tadka is one of my favourite
This is my absolute fav dal. But I have never added chana dal in toor dal. but it sounds interesting. Will try it out! Thanks for sharing your recipe, Shalini!
I dropped by to search for this recipe here and Voila! Like you had read my mind you had posted it! Let me try this out and tell you.
Looking for Panier recipes in your blog now.
Ofcourse, it’s famous in South India too. I prepare this a lot, but I cook tomatoes in cooker itself with dal.
I don’t even know what some of these things are, but the recipe and picture look good enough I might Google them to find out – and try to make this! I do love lentils!