Quinoa Pongal

Pongal is a South-Indian breakfast traditionally made with rice and lentils. It is one of those breakfast that is of the savory type. Serve it with chutney of your choice and YUM <3

It is also not a vegan breakfast, if you have it in India. Loaded with ghee, sometimes even milk added to get a better consistency. If you are vegan, this is a blacklisted menu item if you walk in and order it from an Indian restaurant. Couple of days after my wedding, my mum-in-law had a small pan with oil and ghee heating up. I walked in to the kitchen and went,” Are we making poppadums in the morning?”. She smiled and said, that was for Pongal. So, imagine how much oil this dish requires. I thought she was going to deep-fry something but evidently, not.

When I make it, it is with less oil. And rice, being so starchy, I use quinoa. Super awesome breakfast, fills you up as well/makes it a great option for lunch.

You need:

• Quinoa-1/2 cup
• Split Mung Yellow lentils-1/2 cup
• Water-2.5 cups
• Salt-to taste
• Oil-1 Tbsp
• Mustard seeds (optional) -1/2 tsp
• Cumin seeds-1 heaped tsp
• Cashews-10
• Asafoetida/Hing-1/2 tsp
• Peppercorns-1 Tbsp
• Curry leaves-2 sprigs
• Ginger- an inch and a half piece

Method:

• To either a pressure cooker/a large stock pot, add both quinoa and lentils and roast them on low heat for 3 minutes.
• Add water to the pan and bring it to rolling boil, cover and cook until it is water is all absorbed and lentils are mushy (if not boiled yet, add an extra 1/2 cup water and cook them)
• Meanwhile, in a mortar and pestle crush pepper corns coarsely. Pound ginger really well so it all mashed up well
• Add salt to the cooked lentil and quinoa, set aside.
• Now, time for seasoning. Heat oil in a small pan, add oil, once hot, add cumin seeds and reduce the heat.
• Add hing and cashews and wait until cashews brown and add curry leaves in. After couple of seconds, add both ginger and pepper and fry until ginger starts to crisp up. Pour this over quinoa mixture, and stir them all together.
• Serve with Mint Chutney or Panch Phoran Chutney