I was away this past weekend for a race - The Tour of Arad - three days of racing. That means three days of eating. We rented a house for the team and had a few extras join us too. I was in charge of planning and managing the food. The first thing to check when doing something like this is what people's dietary restrictions are. A few of us eat everything, some don't eat meat, others full vegetarian and some vegan.
So the plan was make a things as vegan as possible, with additions for those who want to eat more animal related products. One of the dishes I made was a lentil curry. The serving suggestions was over roasted sweet potato, with some chopped coriander and chopped green onions. I think its really nice with, feta cheese, yogurt or sour cream too.
Its a great dish, really easy to make and in large quantity too. Its not too heavy, but filling and its nutritious too. Great for a weekend of racing.
Servings: 3-4
Ingredients:
1 cup lentils
1 medium red onion, sliced
3 cloves of garlic (as much as you like really if you like really garlicy curry then you could double this), sliced or chopped
2 table spoons canola oil (sunflower oil works too as would butter of chicken fat)
1 table spoon curry powder
2 large tomatoes chopped.
salt and pepper to taste
Method:
1) Boil lentils with a 2:1 ratio of water to lentils. This takes a while so get this on and start preparing the rest
2) Taste when the lentils are ready, add more water if they need to cook longer. Strain excess water off when they are done
3) While the lentils are cooking, chop the garlic, onion and tomatoes.
4) Heat a large saucepan, or stockpot if you are making larger quantities. Then add the oil
5) Don't let it get too hot.
6) Put the onions and garlic in the oil and turn down the heat so that they sweat.
7) Check that there is still oil in the pan, add more if not. When the onions are softened, do not wait until they get burnt, add the curry powder and stir well for 30 seconds
8) Turn the heat up a little and add the tomatoes, stirring well.
9) once the mixture starts to bubble, turn down to a simmer and allow 5 - 10 mins to thicken. Stir occasionally.
10) Add lentils, if you are making a larger quantity then I would ladle the lentils in stirring well each time to get and even distribution.
11) mix well and turn off the heat.
12) enjoy
