Daal with Pomegranate SEEDS & Cashews

Based on Rukmini Iyer's recipe from The Green Roasting Tin, which I strongly urge you to add to your collection.

This is my absolute favourite daal to make. It's zesty, filling, creamy, and so, so easy. I recommend serving it with plain rice or naan bread. Naan bread is often not vegan though, but in order to ensure it is, you could make your own.

Serves: 4

Prep Time: 10 mins

Cooking Time: 1hr30

Total Time: 1hr40

Ingredients

250g shallots, peeled and halved

or small onions, quartered long-ways

1 tbsp oil

1 bay leaf

2 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp tumeric

1 tsp ground black pepper

5cm ginger, grated

2 cloves of garlic, crushed

225g red or brown lentils, rinsed

700ml boiling water

1 tsp sea salt

150ml coconut milk

1 lime, juice only

To serve

1 pomegranate, seeds only

a handful of fresh coriander, chopped

a generous handful of cashews

Preheat the oven to 180°C fan/200°C/gas 6.
In a deep roasting tin, combine the shallots, oil, bay leaf, cumin, coriander, tumeric, and pepper, mixing well to coat the shallots in the spices. Roast for 25 minutes.
After 25 minutes, add the ginger, garlic, lentils and boiling water to the roasting tin and stir. Cover the tin with foil and return to the oven. Roast for 1 hour.
When the hour is done, add the salt, coconut milk, and lime juice and stir through. Return to the oven, uncovered, for 4-6 minutes. At the same time, place the cashews onto a lined baking tray and put them in the oven alongside the lentils to toast.
After 4-6 minutes, take the lentils out of the oven and tip in the roasted cashews. Sprinkle the pomegranate seeds and coriander on top, and serve with plain rice or naan bread.

*Extra note* - pomegranates can be a real pain to open, and I often used to find myself fumbling around for ages getting the seeds out and slowly staining all my worktops. Then I saw a video like this one, and now I never open pomegranates any other way. You can also remove the seeds in a bowl of water and then tip it all out through a sieve, catching the seeds, to avoid mess.