Thinking about my dahl recipe, which I learned while doing fieldwork in The Gambia a decade ago from a doctor from New Zealand of Indian heritage who was also working out there. Good food really does connect across cultures and across the world, and our personal libraries of recipes are a record of the people who have passed through our lives aren't they. I've lost touch with the doctor, and with my ex's Mum who taught me to cook rice properly. I learned how to cook for groups and make a balanced salad volunteering in Sweden at a summer camp for immigrant and refugee children when I was 18. How we cook is a living memory of everyone we've shared food with over our lives.
#Food #vegan
so my go to is some anglicised version of dahl, with apologies to anyone from the Indian subcontinent who might be about to read this. Fry up an onion and garlic with curry powder then add boiling water, stock ( I use Marigold bouillon) and your pulse - red lentils or split mung beans take about 45 minutes in a pan, yellow or green split peas take more like an hour and a half unless you have a pressure cooker which makes things much faster. You can also add chunks of root vegetables or squash - we get a weekly veg box so this is a good way of using whatever came this time. You can just leave that boiling away, add greens about ten minutes before it finishes for a bit of colour and stir a spoon of mango chutney through before serving for a bit of tang