Vegan Green Lentil Curry

This is a meal I made this summer in France, and everyone loved it so much I made it 3 times in 2 weeks..! It was a bit of a freestyle curry (like most of my cooking!) but the technique is roughly based on my Red lentil Dal, this is how I make most curries the non-traditional way and the lazy way..! I made it again this week and noted down the quantities. It’s the perfect winter warming dish, which gets better after a day or two in the fridge - which makes it the perfect batch cooking dish you can make on a Sunday for the week ahead!

Ingredients :

• 1,5 cups of green lentils/Puy lentils

• 1 onion chopped roughly

• 3 cloves of garlic crushed

• 1 knob of ginger peeled and grated

• 1 tbsp of coconut oil (or other neutral oil)

• 2 cups of vegetable stock

• 1 can of chopped tomatoes

• 1 can of coconut milk

• 2 heaped tsp of curry powder

• 1 tsp of cumin

• 1 tsp of turmeric

• 1/2 tsp of cinnamon powder

• 1 tsp of paprika

• 1 big pinch of salt and black pepper

#block-yui_3_17_2_1_1576521379105_22477 .sqs-gallery-block-grid .sqs-gallery-design-grid { margin-right: -5px; }#block-yui_3_17_2_1_1576521379105_22477 .sqs-gallery-block-grid .sqs-gallery-design-grid-slide .margin-wrapper { margin-right: 5px; margin-bottom: 5px; }

Method :

• On medium heat, sauté your onion and garlic in the coconut oil, until soft for a few minutes.

• Add in your spices to the onion and garlic mix, and add a little more oil if it starts sticking. Sauté with spices for a couple of minutes, then add your ginger, mix everything up.

• At this point, add your washed and drained lentils, and mix everything up until the lentils are coated in the oil/spices/onion.

• Then add in your can of chopped tomatoes, mix in well and let cook for a minute or so.

• Add in your vegetable stock and coconut milk, salt & pepper mix everything well.

• Cook for 20 to 30 min or until your lentils are soft and the broth has thickened. (if the liquid evaporates too quickly, you can add a little more vegetable stock at a time until the lentils are cooked - but you shouldn’t need to if it’s kept on a low/medium heat, simmering gently)

• Once cooked, taste test, and adjust the salt levels if necessary!

• Ready to serve with coconut brown rice, sag aloo if you want, coconut or soy yoghurt raita, mango chutney and papadums! (but between you and me this gets better after a day or so.. like most curries!!)

We served the curry with Michael’s sag aloo which was loosely based on this recipe (but again with a lot of freestyling involved! I’ll try and get him to make it again and show you!) soy yoghurt raita (very simple to make : about a cup of plant yoghurt, juice of a lime, 1/2 tsp of cumin, 1/2 a cucumber chopped up very finely, 1 clove of garlic crushed, salt and pepper, all mixed!) and coconut brown basmati rice! (we cook our rice in vegetable stock, and add desiccated coconut once it’s cooked) we also served it with store-bought papadums (I get them uncooked and then to cook them you pop them in the microwave on max for about 40 sec each, one at a time! this is a tip by my dad, saves you time and they’re oil free!) and mango chutney.

Let me know if you try this at home! Make sure to tag me if you share it too (@taniajoyfjane) - I love to see what you make!!