added this 18 years ago
Spiced Lentils
What you need:
1 1/2 cups raw lentils
2 tablespoons margarine
2 large cloves of garlic, crushed
1 cup minced onion
1 large stalk celery, chopped
1 teaspoon salt
1 cut shredded coconut
1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander
a few tablespoons of water, as needed
black pepper, to taste
juice from one large lemon
2 cups chopped tart apple
cayenne pepper, to taste
What you do:
Cook the lentils in 2 1/4 cups water until tender. Cook everything else, except the apples, until tender. Add the apples to the saute, cook 10 minutes (covered), and then combine with the lentils in a casserole dish. Cover and keep warm in a 250 degree oven.
Preparation Time:
45 minutes - 1 hour
Cooking Time:
Servings:
6-8
Recipe Category:
SO HOW'D IT GO?
The dish turned out wonderfully. I may make brown rice to go with it next time.
But, I should add, I too felt compelled to make some minor modifications to the directions and had to make a couple ingredient modifications based on what I had available at home.
First, the ingredient changes:
-The recipe didn’t specify but I used red lentils. They were complimentary to the dish.
-I didn’t have margarine so I used coconut oil. It worked splendidly and I recommend it.
-I was out of lemons but used the juice of about 3 Mexican limes (similar to Key limes) to produce 3 TBS, plus another TBS of the lime juice sprinkled on the cut apples so they didn’t start browning.
An additional ingredient note, I did not peel my apples, I simply cored and chopped them. I’m guessing this was the intent of the recipe and even if it weren’t I would have likely left the skins on.
Now the method I used.
- I cooked the onions and celery together and added the salt to sweat the vegetables.
- Once the onions were translucent, I added the coconut and the remaining spices with the lime juice and the few TBS of water mentioned in the recipe and cooked them for just a minute or two.
- I added the lentils and cooked together with the vegetable, coconut, spice mix for a couple of minutes then added water but I added about 2 ¾ cups of water instead of the 2 ¼.
I added the apples after the lentils were cooking for about 10 mins.
While the comments are several years old, I thought I would add my responses.
Several said they thought the coconut made it (or would make it) too sweet. At risk of insulting their sensibility, I wonder if they used sweetened coconut. I found the dish to be quite savory and not sweet at all, save the bites of apple.
I like the idea in the suggestions of adding the raisins, sultanas or currants but I didn’t have any. It would be a great addition.
Also, some slivered almonds added just before serving might add some nice crunch.
I will definately be making this again.
Oh, adding a little Asafetida might be good too. :)
I was quite disappointed with this recipe. I'm not sure what I was expecting but not this!
I think it was a bit bland for my tastes, so I should've doubled the spices and that would've helped. I also think that it wasn't savoury enough for me - what with the cinnamon, apple, coconut and ginger, it was just a bit too dessert-y for me. I think I ended up adding quite a bit of cayenne to even this out.
It was easy to make, but don't know if I'd bother with it again, sorry.
I can't spell... *definitely*
Wow, I really liked this!
I was looking for something different, and this was definately different! I did leave a few ingredients out, though. I did not use turmeric (I do not like the spice...), margarine, or coconut. I think it would have been a bit too sweet with coconut, so I am glad I left that out.
Great recipe!
Wow, I am SO pleased with how this turned out... it such a treat! I added raisins, and they were a great touch... this is a WONDERFUL combination of ingredients and flavors, thanks SO much for the great recipe. I will definitely make this again.
excellent recipe!
This turned out really well! A few things I did differently:
- used 3/4 cup red lentils and 1 3/4 c. water, with 2 star anise
- didn't have coriander
- put some raisins in with the lentils when they were almost done cooking.
I thought the directions weren't terribly clear on this, but I cooked the lentils/anise/raisins in one pot and sauteed everything else in another, then combined them at the end and didn't bother with the oven.
This is a good recipe. I really liked the sweet, spicy combination. It's quite tasty with brown rice and a little vegan sour cream. At least that's how we had it! I word of caution, though. I used green french lentils, and I discovered that they required significan'tly more water than the recipe notes. I didn't get them quite as tender as I wanted, so next time I'll be sure to follow standard lentil cooking instructions. This was my blunder, I'm sure.