India Chow

[Too Tall]

My neighbor gave me a recipe that I'm afraid is full of mystery. This caucasian can't quite wrap my head around some of the directions so here goes.
He calls it "Eggplant Ajantakka".
1. Shallow fry eggplant chunks than add onions and garnish *powder. That is the story. Below is the garnish powder.

Garnish powder:
1 Chana dal 1 cup + udad dal 1 cup > fry or roast with scant oil than mix with cumin, corriander and chillies (fry all together) than grind in a blender.

Clues appreciated.

[echappist]

My neighbor gave me a recipe that I'm afraid is full of mystery. This caucasian can't quite wrap my head around some of the directions so here goes.
He calls it "Eggplant Ajantakka".
1. Shallow fry eggplant chunks than add onions and garnish *powder. That is the story. Below is the garnish powder.

Garnish powder:
1 Chana dal 1 cup + udad dal 1 cup > fry or roast with scant oil than mix with cumin, corriander and chillies (fry all together) than grind in a blender.

Clues appreciated.

Take the recipe to your nearest grocery store catering to South Asian Diaspora, and the shopkeeper should be able to help you out.

Cumin, coriander, and chilies (I assumed paprika or something similar) are often used in various Indian/Pakistani recipes.

The chana dal part is confusing. Pretty sure that's a dish in its own right. https://www.vegrecipesofindia.com/ch...ipe-chana-dal/

"udad dal" [sic] is urad dal, a lentil (I think dal refers to lentil). https://www.tarladalal.com/glossary-urad-dal-941i

Personally, I'd be flustered by the lack of instruction re: frying. I've gotten into preparing South Asian cooking the last few years, and the frying is almost always done as the or one of the initial steps by frying something like an onion in butter/oil/ghee in the presence of spices. This "opens" up the spices and traps the flavor in the onion, which then delivers the flavor into the actual main ingredient (veggies, meats, what have you).

PS. My wife made a chana dal-ish dish a while back. We got a seasoning pack for some lentils/chickpeas we had. Depending on how you make it, the kitchen could smell downright awful for about an hour (I think this is when she treated the beans with sodium bicarbonate, but I can't recall), but the actual food tasted great.

PPS. Warning: neither I nor my wife is of South Asian descent, but I do have a copy of Indian cooking for Instapots and have been making curries/ biryanis/ what have you pretty consistently the last few years. Your post now makes me want to get some okra curry that we got last time (although I should just learn how to cook the damn thing)

[one60]

Not the answer you were hoping for but we have a friend in Mumbai who is an exceptional cook, she recommends the cookbook from London's Dishoom. Excellent and accessible recipes, some of which can be found via google. We find the biggest challenge is obtaining the various spices...

[Mark Kelly]

Channa dahl is dried chickpeas, aka garbanzo beans. Urad dahl is, as noted above, a dried bean like a dark mung bean.

In powder form, channa becomes besan flour.

What your recipe is calling for is essentially spiced mixed besan / urad flour: fry or roast the soaked channa / urad until they are crisp, add the spices then grind to make a coarse spiced flour.

[Too Tall]

Channa dahl is dried chickpeas, aka garbanzo beans. Urad dahl is, as noted above, a dried bean like a dark mung bean.

In powder form, channa becomes besan flour.

What your recipe is calling for is essentially spiced mixed besan / urad flour: fry or roast the soaked channa / urad until they are crisp, add the spices then grind to make a coarse spiced flour.

Mark nailed it. "channa becomes besan flour" that was the clue I was looking for and saves me from pleading for clues from my generous neighbor.

Fair is fair, he is inspired by my Italian and BBQ cooking and I know that often my assumptions fly right past him. So it is certainly fair that I'm struggling.

Anywho, the dish came out fantastic and will be on repeat. Next time it gets some ground chili peppers (omitted for Mrs. Too) and more cumin.

[Wisco]

Channa dahl is dried chickpeas, aka garbanzo beans. Urad dahl is, as noted above, a dried bean like a dark mung bean.

In powder form, channa becomes besan flour.

What your recipe is calling for is essentially spiced mixed besan / urad flour: fry or roast the soaked channa / urad until they are crisp, add the spices then grind to make a coarse spiced flour.

What Mark said is what my Mom would say. The only thing to add is that Urud Dal is only dark because of it's skin. The grain itself is white and looks like this when it is split and husked:

Dal by shenoi, on Flickr

The husked white version is the mildest as the skin has a stronger flavor i don't care for. Urud dal is of course the base of vada batter, the core of dosa batter along with rice and often dropped into your tempering oil (tadak) to add a bit of crunch to your bailed lentil dalitoye, my Konkan mother's milk.

[Too Tall]

Keep talking Wisco.
Fortunately I did have Urad dal on hand because of my (failed) dosa trials. LOL I did make a few really decent Dosas however repeatability would be mostly dumb luck and a few more cursed pans ;)
The dalitoye you speak of is one of my personal comfort foods. I did not know it had a name until you said it and googled: https://udupi-recipes.com/dalitoye-d...yle-dal-recipe

[gt6267a]

Not the answer you were hoping for but we have a friend in Mumbai who is an exceptional cook, she recommends the cookbook from London's Dishoom. Excellent and accessible recipes, some of which can be found via google. We find the biggest challenge is obtaining the various spices...

Black Daal from the Dishoom cookbook. It was delicious. Most of the local restaurants add some heat to their daal makhani and this is decidedly not spicy.

IMG_2008-1.jpg

[Too Tall]

Lovely Daal. I'm low and will check out that recipe.