Sindhi Moong Dal

This is my second entry for Mathy's JFI-Garlic event.

Actually Garlic is such an important ingredient that almost everything that I cook has Garlic in it. There are some dishes which just cant do without Garlic & some where it might be an optional thing, but I generally use them in every dish possible.

Apart from being tasty, Garlic contains a lot of medicinal value as well. Garlic is known to have antibiotic properties. I remember my granny used to give us dry roasted garlic whenever we had cough or cold. It is even suitable for young babies. I have myself used Garlic when S had cold when she was just 5 months old. A Garlic clove was immersed in boiling water for 2-3 min & removed and this water was used for her formula milk.

Its a well known fact now that Garlic is very helpful in combating high blood pressure. Eating 1-2 cloves of raw garlic first thing in the morning helps in maintaining healthy BP levels.

In fact most of the spices/herbs/ingredients used in Indian cooking are known to have such versatile properties. Haldi(Turmeric) being another example.

Coming back to the event, the reason I chose this Dal for JFI-Garlic is that it has a very distinct taste of Garlic in it. I would say that the main flavour itself is Garlic. None of the spices over shadow the taste of Garlic.
I found this recipe on the packet of Moong Dal that I had bought. I made it for the first time to just check out the recipe & it turned out so good that we have this Dal almost every alternate day now. Since Toor Dal is usually the staple Dal in our diets, it takes a while to get used to the taste of moong Dal.

I made some changes to the recipe I found on the packet. The major one being that they had asked to make the tadka & add it to the cooked Dal. Instead I made the tadka, added the cooked Dal to it & cooked for some more time so that the flavours got infused in the Dal properly.

Ingredients

1 cup Yellow Moong Dal

2-3 cloves garlic, chopped

1-2 green chillies (depending upon how spicy you like it), cut & slit

1 medium sized tomato, chopped

1/2 inch ginger, chopped

1 tsp Dhaniya Jeera (Coriander-Cumin) powder

1/2 tsp mustard seeds

1 tsp Cumin seeds

Salt

Method:

Pressure cook the Dal along with the green chillies, ginger, tomatoes, haldi, 1/2 tsp cumin seeds and a little salt.

In a pan heat oil. Add mustard seeds, when they start to splutter add the remaining cumin seeds & garlic. Fry for sometime.

Then add the Dhaniya jeera powder & mix. Add the cooked Dal and salt. Let this cook for 4-5 min. Add chopped coriander leaves & cook for another 2-3 minutes.

Serve hot with Rice or Chapatis/Rotis.