Salata Adas- Lebanese Lentil Salad with Cumin & Mint

I am not a great fan of lentils in salads but occasionally I use them to make chaats and other type of salads.Normally its the soup or sides  that comes to my mind whenever I think of lentils.But this is a simple Lebanese style salad which I adapted from Kalyn. The original is supposed to be from Saveur and it turned out wonderful or much tastier than expected. I have prepared this with brown lentils or whole black masoor or Egyptian lentils as they are also known. Green Lentils or French lentils also work fine with this recipe.

Ingredients:
Whole Black Masoor/Brown/black/Egyptian lentils: atleast 1/2 cup

Lemon Juice: 2 tbsp +
Extra Virgin Olive Oil: 2 tbsp +
Garlic Clove: 2-3 cloves finely minced

Cumin Powder: 1/2 tsp +
Allspice Powder: 1/4 tsp +

Fresh Flat Leaf Parsley: 1 -2 tbsp chopped
Fresh Mint : 1-2 tbsp chopped

Salt & Pepper: as per taste

Preparation: 

Cook the lentils in water till tender. Make sure they are not mushy. Stove top cooking for 15+ minutes is better here than pressure cooker which may make it mushy. I soaked the lentils for around 15-30 minutes in hotwater before cooking and it was cooked under 20 minutes. Drain and keep aside.

In a small pan,heat around 1 tbsp of EVOO and add minced garlic to it. Saute the garlic till it starts perfuming the oil and is just about to change the colour.Turn off the heat.

Whisk together the rest of the EVOO,lemon juice, cumin powder and crushed allspice berry till it emulsifies to a smooth silky dressing. Add this to the warm garlic-oil and turn on the heat for another minute. Pour this garlicky spicy hot dressing on the lentils and mix well. Toss in chopped herbs and salt and pepper. Adjust the seasonings and serve warm as a side salad.

You can also have this as a mini meal or snack or  light lunch and can even use this as a stuffing for tortillas /ricepaper rolls /pita breads.You can serve it with couscous of pasta mixed in for a hearty comforting meal.I had as a side salad and found it filling and comforting. The freshness of herbs with the comfort of the lentils is heartily appreciated.

Right now, the salad is on way to visit NCR:Lentils at Tinned Tomatoes.

Msakaet al Bathinjan - Eggplant Casserole

This is a simple dish from Lebanon made using fried eggplants and chickpeas.I have adapted the recipe from here.Normally the eggplants are deepfried and then mixed into a thick gravy of tomatoes,garlic,chilli and onion to which dried mint has been added.I have pan fried the eggplants and also used tomato puree instead of peeled tomatoes and have obtained a hearty thick comforting dish which goes well with breads.

 

Ingredients:
Eggplant: 1 medium size sliced into rounds or half rounds as I did

Chickpeas: 1/4 cup soaked and cooked till done.

Tomatoes: 2 big, blanched,peeled and sliced or Tomato puree
Onion: chopped 1 medium
Garlic: 2-3 cloves  roasted /grilled/deep fried in oil - I used fresh garlic cloves.
Sugar: a pinch
Fresh Green chilli: 1-2 as per taste


Garlic: 1-2 cloves crushed along with little salt
Dried mint: 2 tsp or as per taste

Salt: as per taste

Preparation:

Presoak chickpeas and cook in the pressure cooker or stovetop till done.Keep aside.You can also use canned chickpeas.Cut the eggplant into bite size pieces -circles/half circles- and apply salt and keep aside for atleast 15 minutes.They will gove out moisture /bitterness as it is also known. Prepare a grill/oven /pan for grilling/roasting/panfrying them applying oil/spray.I pan fried them till they turned brown and cooked on both the sides.

Heat oil in a thick pan (casserole) ,add chopped onions and saute until transparent and soft.Stir in garlic and saute until it gets aromatic and starts turning brown. The recipe calls for garlic that is already fried in oil to be added to the onion and sauteed.Since we are already planning to sautee it,I did not think there is any need to previously fry the garlic in oil.So I have added chopped fresh garlic to the soft onions and cooked till brown.

Add in tomatoes/puree,slit green chillies,salt,dash of sugar and chicpeas along with aa little of the water in which they are cooked.If using the canned chicpeas,adjust the salt accordingly.Bring to a boil,reduce and let it cook for a few minutes,until the raw smell of tomatoes disappear.Add in the eggplant pieces and cook covered for about 10 minutes, until the eggplant absorbs the flavours.Add in crushed garlic cloves and dried mint as a garnish and cook for 2 more minutes.

Serve as a side dish preferably cold,but I enjoyed it warm as it goes well with rotis/breads/rice.

Th dish was simple and doable and the combo of eggplant-chickpeas is hearty.The dish can be garlicky but the dried mint refreshes the mouth.Adjust the chilli,mint and garlic according to taste.Normally I am vary of making such dishes where there is only one spice/herb - green chilli in this case along with heavy other items like eggplants,chickpeas,tomatoes etc as I feel the spice will be inadequate to spice it up entirely.Even in North Indian dishes for a combo like this,we use coriander powder,garam masala ,cumin powder, chilli powder etc inaddition to green chillies. So here I added 2 medium sized green chillies and was surprised to find that they are sufficient. The dish is spicy just by using chillies.Also I have not tasted/seen the original,but mine turned out almost 'gravyless' or very thick me.Do adjust the amount of water to get a gravy of your preferance.

The dish is my humble contribution to MM:Taste of Lebanon at Dirty Kitchen Secrets, an event by Meeta.

Balila -Lebanese Chickpea Salad

This is a simple salad made with chickpeas and mostly nothing else.Balila is a Lebanese style salad and is basically cumin flavoured chikpeas with outher optional ingredients like tomato,cheese,onion,pinenuts etc .Another general Mediterranean version called Balela includes blackbeans as well.I made a simple version found here which has chickpeas, cumin and uses butter fried pinenuts for an exotic touch.

Ingredients:

Chickpeas: 1/2 cup presoaked and cooked till done. OR Canned chickpeas

Olive Oil

Cumin powder

Garlic: 1-2 small cloves minced/crushed

Salt as per taste

Pine nuts: handful

Butter:1-2 tbsp

Preparation:

Cook chickpeas till done .Drain the chickpeas and mix it with salt,cumin powder,crushed garlic and olive oil.This is actually a dressing to the chickpeas.Melt butter in a pan,add in pinenuts and saute till golden brown. Pour this pinenuts along with the remaining butter on top of the chickpea mixture as a garnish.

The salad is spicy and pinenuts add a different crunch.Chickpeas is something that is always there in my pantry.The salad also makes use of pinenuts which I had hoarded from US and so this simple salad goes to NCR:Store Cupboard hosted this time by Jacqueline of Tinned Tomatoes.