South Asian

A refreshing rice dish that may be served with vegetables, bean and split-pea dishes, and chutneys. Sometimes, I just eat it all by itself with a large green salad.

Jasmine rice is very different in texture and taste from basmati rice. It is more clingy, more spongy, and more glutinous and, at its best, has a jasmine-like aroma. On some days it is exactly the soothing rice I yearn for. It is certainly closer to the daily rice eaten in South, East, and West India, where basmati rice is reserved for special occasions only. Look for good-quality jasmine rice, usually sold by Thai and other Oriental grocers. Sadly, price is often a good indication of quality. I usually do not bother to wash it, as I enjoy its slightly sticky quality.

One of the oldest Indian dishes and continuously popular these thousands of years is khichri, a dish of rice and split peas. (Starting around the Raj period, the British began to serve a version of khichri in their country homes for breakast: they removed the dal, added fish, and called it kedgeree.) There are two general versions of it: one is dry, like well-cooked rice, where each grain is separate, and the other is wet, like a porridge. Both are delicious. The first is more elegant, the second more soothing. This is the first, the dry version. Serve it like rice, with all manner of curries.

A delicious pilaf that may be served with most Indian meals.

Lemon grass is grown on the edges of the more precipitous slopes of Sri Lanka’s numerous tea gardens. Some of these plantations are visible from the front patio of Ena’s mountain bungalow. Lemon grass keeps insects away, and its long roots hold back the soil. I had this aromatic and festive dish in the museum-like home of Sri Lankan batik artist Ena de Silva, where it was served with dozens of curries and relishes. You may serve this at banquets and family meals alike. It goes well with coconut-milk-based curries, such as Kerala-Style Chicken Curry.

The Indian split peas, arhar dal and toovar (or toor) dal, are closely related. Both are the hulled and split descendants of the pigeon pea. Arhar, the North Indian version, is milder in flavor, whereas toovar, used in West and South India, tends to be darker and earthier. Use whichever you can find. If you cannot find either, use yellow split peas. Serve with rice or Indian flatbreads. Add a vegetable and relishes to complete the meal. Non-vegetarians may add meat or fish, if they like.

Basmati rice is easy to cook if you follow these simple directions: Buy good-quality rice with unbroken grains. The rice should have a pronounced basmati odor. Wash, soak, and drain the rice. Cook it with a light hand without heavy-handed stirring, as the grains can break easily. This could be an everyday rice when served with a simple dal, vegetable, and relish, or a party rice if served with a fish or meat curry.

I have only eaten this slightly sweet and slightly sour dish in Gujarat, and how good it was, too. It isn’t just corn grains that are cooked in the dal but the cob itself, lopped off into reasonably sized rounds. The woody part of the cob flavors the dal in mysterious ways. You just cannot pick up these corn pieces with Western cutlery. Hands are required to eat the corn off the dal-and-spice-flavored cob sections. If you cannot find toor dal (also labeled toovar dal and arhar dal), use any other split peas that you can find easily, such as red lentils or yellow split peas. Just remember that red lentils cook faster than toor dal. This dal is put into individual serving bowls and served with rice or Indian flatbreads. A selection of other vegetables and relishes are also included in vegetarian meals. Non-vegetarians might add fish or chicken.

This is a Bengali specialty that requires that the moong dal (hulled and split mung beans) be lightly roasted first and then, when the dal is almost done, quick-cooking greens such as mustard greens, spinach, or green chard are added to make it more nourishing. There are several tiny steps required here, but each is simplicity itself. I find that most split peas and beans are so clean these days that they need no picking over. You do need to rinse them off. In the case of this recipe, the rinsing is done after the roasting, for obvious reasons. Bengalis might use mustard oil for the final seasoning. It complements the mustard greens and adds its own unique flavor. But since it is frowned upon by Western food authorities for the harmful acids it contains, I have started using extra virgin olive oil instead, another strong flavor, though a different one. For many peasants, such a dal, served with rice and perhaps followed by a yogurt dessert, makes for a rich, ample meal. You may add a fish dish.

Our family can eat this every single day of the week. It is my soul food. I love this with Plain Basmati Rice and any vegetable I feel like that day. I also love to add Lemony Ground Lamb with Mint and Cilantro.

This delicious dal curry may also be made with moong dal or an equal mixture of red lentils, masoor dal, and moong dal. Serve with rice and fish.

An everyday dal to be served with rice, vegetables, and curries. (In Bangladesh, the curry would often be made with fish.)

Red lentils, sold in Indian shops as skinless masoor dal and in some places as Egyptian red lentils, usually come in various shades of salmon pink. They originated in the Middle East but came into India quite early and are eaten throughout North India. This particular dish may be served with most Indian meals. It also happens to be particularly scrumptious over a pasta such as penne or fusilli.

For vegetarians, these refreshing lentils, accompanied perhaps by Yogurt Relish with Okra and a bread, Indian or crusty Western, could make an entire meal. For non-vegetarians, meats or fish curries may be added.

There was a time when the easy-to-use canned chickpeas came in such a tin-tasting liquid that they needed not only draining but rinsing as well. The liquid was unusable. Lately, I have found canned organic chickpeas that are in a lovely natural liquid, quite similar to what I get when I boil my own. This is a giant leap, indeed. Look for them. The chickpeas may be served with Indian flatbreads or rice. Eggplants, greens, and relishes would complete the meal. Meats may always be added.

Eating a karhi is really a way of eating heated yogurt. Because yogurt would curdle into unappetizing blobs if it were to be just heated up, it is stabilized with a flour first. In India, where there are many vegetarians who know that a bean, a grain, and a milk product can make for a balanced meal, it is chickpea flour that is used. Known variously as garbanzo flour, gram flour, chickpea flour, farine de pois chiches, and besan, it is very nutritious as well as full of a nutty flavor. Karhis are cooked over much of India with many interesting regional variations. This yogurt sauce, spicily seasoned and quite scrumptious, is either poured over rice or put into individual bowls and eaten with whole-grain flatbreads. Meats and vegetables are often served on the side.

I use cremini mushrooms here since they are very firm, but ordinary white mushrooms will do as well. You may add finely chopped fresh green chilies (1–2 teaspoons) toward the end of the cooking, as many Indians do, if you want the dish to be hotter. This may be served at a meal but also makes a wonderful snack as a “wrap” if rolled inside any flatbread. Thinly sliced onions, cilantro, and chopped tomatoes may be rolled inside too. Any chutney from this book or good-quality store-bought salsa could be used instead of the onion-cilantro-tomato mixture.

Here is an everyday dish with a fair number of ingredients. Once you have them all prepared and assembled, the rest is fairly easy. Remember that you can chop the onions in a food processor. I have used two 15-ounce cans of organic chickpeas, draining them to separate the liquid so I can measure it. If you are not using organic canned chickpeas, use water instead of the can liquid. If the can liquid is not enough, add water to get the correct amount. Serve with Indian or Middle Eastern breads (you can even roll up the chickpeas inside them) with Yogurt Sambol with Tomato and Shallot, page 249, on the side. At a dinner, add meat and a vegetable.

In India, dried beans and peas may be combined with almost any vegetable. Here, I use either pumpkin or butternut squash. It gives a mellow sweetness to the dish. In India, this would be eaten with whole-wheat flatbreads, yogurt relishes, salads, and pickles. For a Western meal, the beans may be served with a sliced baguette as a first course or with roast pork or roast lamb.

Sometimes when I am in a rush and still longing for an Indian dal, I take the simple way out and use canned beans—black, great northern, cannellini, or any other beans I like. Today we can get organic canned beans of excellent quality, and it barely takes 15 minutes to cook them. Even the liquid in the can tastes good, so I do not have to throw it away. Serve these with rice or Indian flatbreads.