Dahl Soup for Dull Days

After a nice long period of wallowing in disposable income, vacationing abroad, and hosting my lovely man-friend in Changwon, I'm back to a far less thrilling reality. Damn.

No money means no meat, so here's a simple recipe for my mom's dahl soup which is tasty, really cost effective, and pretty easy to make.


Dahl soup

-2 cups split red lentils
-1/3 cup chickpea flour
   (aka gram, besan, chana dal flour)
-10 cloves garlic, minced
-3 inches of ginger root, peeled and minced
-2 large onions, diced
-2 tbsp turmeric
-salt to taste
-1 tsp black pepper
-1/2 tsp chili flakes
-3 tbsp butter
-3 tbsp olive oil

This recipe has 3 main steps: brown, boil, and fry. First, we brown; you need to roast both the chickpea flour and the lentils prior to cooking the soup (but not at the same time!). This will give the dish a better, fuller flavour - necessary when something savory lacks tastytasty meat and cruelty. In a dry pan over high heat, stir the chickpea flour constantly until it browns in color - this shouldn't take much more than 5 minutes. Set the flour aside and get your soup pot.

Place the pot over high heat and roast the lentils until they yellow. You might notice a few dark brown or black ones - no biggie. Just keep stirring.

Once the lentils are sufficiently roasted, pour in roughly 6 cups of water to stop the browning. Add in the minced ginger and turmeric, bring it all to a boil, then reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer the concoction covered until the lentils are soft (about 45 minutes).

While your lentils are cooking in the pot, melt the butter into the oil in a pan. Fry the onions, garlic, and chili together over medium-high heat until the garlic is browned and the onions are soft. Once that's done, turn off the heat and set the pan aside for a bit.

Back to the soup pot: when your lentils are soft it's time to add in the toasted flour. Gradually whisk the flour into your lentil goop until well incorporated. Don't worry if there are a few little lumps. Toss in the fried things and all of the fat you fried them in, along with enough water to get the soup to your desired consistency. I usually end up throwing in an extra 6 cups because I like it fairly thick, but you can always add more if you like. Add in the pepper and salt to taste and allow the whole pot to return to a boil. Turn that shit off and leave it to mellow for a few hours - in my experience, it always tastes better the next day.

I think it's particularly nice topped with a bit of freshly chopped cilantro and a quick squeeze of lime. I, however, do not have either readily available; far-less-thrilling-reality, indeed.