Ingredients
To pressure cook dal –
Toor dal (Pigeon peas) – ½ cup
Peanuts – 1 tablespoon
Water – 1 cup
Other ingredients –
Water – 2 cups
Red chili powder – ½ teaspoon
Turmeric powder – ¼ teaspoon
Tomato – ¼ cup, chopped
Green chili – 1, slit
Ginger paste – ½ teaspoon
Jaggery – 1 tablespoon **Notes
Salt – to taste
Lemon juice – 1 tablespoon **Notes
Cilantro – few sprigs, chopped
For Seasoning (Tadka) –
Oil – 1 tablespoon
Mustard seeds – ¼ teaspoon
Cumin seeds – ¼ teaspoon
Fenugreek seeds (Methi dana) – 6-7
Clove – 1
Cinnamon stick – ½ inch piece
Bay leaf – 1
Dried red chili – 1, broken into two pieces
Curry leaves – 5-6
Asafetida (Hing) – very small pinch
Instructions
Wash toor dal well under running cold water till water runs clear.
Take dal and 1 cup of water to the pressure cooker. Now using small muslin cloth, take peanuts on it and tie it, make like a ‘potli’. Put it into pressure cooker.
Cover it with lid, put the weight on. Turn the heat to medium. And let it whistle 5-6 times. let the pressure go down by itself and then open the cover. It should look like this.
Now remove that peanuts potli and looks these are also boiled well.
Now add 2 cups of water to the dal and blend it using immersion hand blender. We want smooth dal, not a single piece of dal in it. Now you got it, we want those peanuts whole that why we boiled it in muslin cloth.
Now add turmeric powder, red chili powder and salt. Oops look like I added too much, no it’s not like that. Chili powder just gets spreaded as I added.
Mix and add ginger paste, green chilies and tomatoes.
Add jaggery and mix it.
Turn the heat on medium-low. And let the dal boil for good 10 minutes. If it’s get too thick then add more water.
Meanwhile heat the oil in a small pan for tadka on medium heat. Once hot, add mustard seeds let them pop. Add cumin seeds let them sizzle. Add fenugreek seeds. Cook for 15 seconds.
Now add bay leaf, cinnamon stick, clove and dried red chili. Cook for few seconds, you will get nice aroma from whole spices.
Add curry leaves and hing.
Add it to boiling dal.
Mix it and let it simmer till you get desire consistency. Keep in mind that Gujarati dal has thinner consistency than any other Punjabi dal.
Finally add lemon juice and boiled peanuts. Mix it and garnish with chopped cilantro.