Are you boiling your rice and lentils together? Does that work? What variety of lentils? Rice? This could be a game changer for my “too lazy to do more than boil water” nights.
And I mean, if you time it right, I imagine you can cook any combination of rice and lentil varieties together.
Well, except beluga lentils, as those turn the water black, which dyes the rice into a rather unappetizing color. 🥴
But if you’re lazy, then I’d generally recommend split lentils. They get their hull removed, which makes cooking them much quicker. You’re also normally supposed to pre-soak lentils and pour the water out, to make them more nutritious and less farty, which you don’t have to do for split lentils.
In the shops, you will usually find “red lentils” and sometimes “yellow lentils”, which are split lentils. If they look not quite round and a bit frizzy, then they are split lentils. Like this:
And then, yeah, white rice, Basmati rice or Jasmin rice is usually close enough to their cooking time. But both, rice and lentils, don’t need insanely precise cooking times anyways, so a few minutes difference is usually still no problem.
Non-split lentils and brown rice or wild rice also have similar cooking times.
My personal staple is Basmati + split red lentils.
Note: I’m not a huge rice expert and had to actually read up on some of the differences just now. If something seems off, I’m probably just dumb. 🫠
What’s your go to seasoning blend for a basic dish? Sorry for the game of 20 questions, but lentils aren’t the staple in my region that they are elsewhere. I want to be more versatile in how I use them (and other legumes). I’ve got red beans and rice on lock, and I made a mean pot of frijoles charro last night, but, to date, lentils are basically nothing more than a way to bulk out ground meat recipes like taco meat or sloppy joes. I could stand to learn how to enjoy them in a more naked form, so to speak.
Mujadara/megadara is a classic lentil+rice dish. I love it. At its core, it’s burnt/heavily caramalised onions, brown lentils, rice, salt. Cumin is a must imo, along with a pinch of cinnamon. Add a pinch of baking soda to the onions 2 mins into cooking them, and they’ll caramalise way faster
Unfortunately, I too am from a region that does not really value lentils. We have a singular lentil dish that’s really popular here, but hardly anything beyond that.
The dish also hardly uses seasoning. 🫠
Very basically, you cook some brown lentils and separately, make a roux. Then combine the two. Add salt, a bayleaf and a splash of vinegar. Eat with soft noodles.
As for non-regional recipes that I’m aware of:
Lentil curry is great. You can basically just make a normal curry and replace whatever protein you’d use with lentils.
The Indian cuisine has tons of dishes under the term “dal”. I believe, that word does just mean “split lentils”, but you will find lots of recipes with that term anyways.
To my knowledge, what many(/most?) of these recipes also share is that they overcook split lentils until they disintegrate and you’re left with a creamy base, which you can then pimp with all kinds of spices.
Are you boiling your rice and lentils together? Does that work? What variety of lentils? Rice? This could be a game changer for my “too lazy to do more than boil water” nights.
I do, yeah. I also saw this sentence on Wikipedia earlier today, so I don’t think I’m alone in that:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lentil
And I mean, if you time it right, I imagine you can cook any combination of rice and lentil varieties together.
Well, except beluga lentils, as those turn the water black, which dyes the rice into a rather unappetizing color. 🥴
But if you’re lazy, then I’d generally recommend split lentils. They get their hull removed, which makes cooking them much quicker. You’re also normally supposed to pre-soak lentils and pour the water out, to make them more nutritious and less farty, which you don’t have to do for split lentils.
In the shops, you will usually find “red lentils” and sometimes “yellow lentils”, which are split lentils. If they look not quite round and a bit frizzy, then they are split lentils. Like this:
And then, yeah, white rice, Basmati rice or Jasmin rice is usually close enough to their cooking time. But both, rice and lentils, don’t need insanely precise cooking times anyways, so a few minutes difference is usually still no problem.
Non-split lentils and brown rice or wild rice also have similar cooking times.
My personal staple is Basmati + split red lentils.
Note: I’m not a huge rice expert and had to actually read up on some of the differences just now. If something seems off, I’m probably just dumb. 🫠
What’s your go to seasoning blend for a basic dish? Sorry for the game of 20 questions, but lentils aren’t the staple in my region that they are elsewhere. I want to be more versatile in how I use them (and other legumes). I’ve got red beans and rice on lock, and I made a mean pot of frijoles charro last night, but, to date, lentils are basically nothing more than a way to bulk out ground meat recipes like taco meat or sloppy joes. I could stand to learn how to enjoy them in a more naked form, so to speak.
Mujadara/megadara is a classic lentil+rice dish. I love it. At its core, it’s burnt/heavily caramalised onions, brown lentils, rice, salt. Cumin is a must imo, along with a pinch of cinnamon. Add a pinch of baking soda to the onions 2 mins into cooking them, and they’ll caramalise way faster
Unfortunately, I too am from a region that does not really value lentils. We have a singular lentil dish that’s really popular here, but hardly anything beyond that.
The dish also hardly uses seasoning. 🫠
Very basically, you cook some brown lentils and separately, make a roux. Then combine the two. Add salt, a bayleaf and a splash of vinegar. Eat with soft noodles.
As for non-regional recipes that I’m aware of:
To my knowledge, what many(/most?) of these recipes also share is that they overcook split lentils until they disintegrate and you’re left with a creamy base, which you can then pimp with all kinds of spices.