lentils

Lentil bolognese

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Over the years I’ve tried variations on this lentil bolognese theme and it’s now grown into a delicious concoction of tried and tested recipes.  Packed with vegetables it cooks into a deep, rich-flavoured stewy-type sauce.
I often use puy lentils as they hold their form well, but brown lentils also work although they can become mushy if overcooked.  Best to do a taste test after c 20 mins to see if their texture is to your liking.

Last weekend I thought this recipe might work with a Christmas vibe, so I added cranberries and chestnuts to the base veg mix.
I probably added them to the pan too soon!  Most of the fab sour-fruitiness of the cranberries was cooked away, plus I couldn’t really taste the chestnuts.  On my second attempt the other night, I stirred in a handful of fresh cranberries for the last 8 mins of cooking.  Gave the whole dish a very festive look.

So, if you feel like a change over the silly season, a rice or pasta dish instead of roasted everything, then give it a try.  Perhaps even a dollop of cranberry sauce on top!

Some lentil advice:

I always soak lentils despite packet instructions, or the powers that think-they-be, claiming it’s not necessary as they’re small.

Small or not, they belong to the  pulse/bean/legume family, and this family contains oligosaccharydes, a type of carbohydrate (it’s the ‘O’ in FODMAP* ….ohhh!).
Our gut microbes break down these carbs, and in doing so, produce beneficial compounds but also gases which can cause bloating/wind/discomfort for some.
Soaking overnight will reduce the amount of  ‘Os’  and make them easier to digest.  And this soaking will also reduce the amount of phytic acid that we mainly find in the outer layer of the pulse, something that can interfere with enzymes that help us digest.  Phytic acid also binds to minerals in our food, and can prevent their absorption.  We need minerals!  Our calcium, magnesium, iron, zinc, potassium….so there’s only gains to be had by soaking those lentils!
Ok, enough lentil chat.

Ingredients

serves 4, with rice or pasta

160 g soaked lentils. I used puy but try others; be aware of cooking time as some turn mushy
3 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1/2 leek, green part, chopped
1 stick celery, chopped
1 large carrot, chopped
3 large or 4 small garlic cloves, pressed or finely chopped
1 can chopped tomatoes
2-3 tbsp Dorsetshire sauce (vegan type of Worcestershire sauce with no anchovies; Bonsan and The Condiment company are two examples of other vegan Worcestershire sauces)
1/2 litre vegetable broth plus half to one cup more added near the end of cooking IF you want your bolognese more liquid
leaves of 4 sprigs of fresh thyme
chopped fresh parsley for decoration

Method

Soak the lentils the night before, discard the water, rinse and sieve then you’re ready to start.

Add olive oil to a deep pan on a medium heat, and cook the onions until transparent.  Stir in the chopped leek and cook until slightly softened.  Add the celery, carrots, garlic and gently cook for about 15 minutes.  Then come the lentils, can of chopped tomatoes, tomato puree, veg stock and the thyme leaves.

Simmer on a low to medium heat for about 40 minutes until the sauce has thickened and the lentils are cooked to your liking (I usually do a taste test around 30-35 minutes or earlier, depending on the type of lentil).

For a Christmas flavour, add cranberries for the last 8 minutes of cooking and enjoy with brown or mixed rice, or any pasta your digestion loves 🙂

 

*FODMAP  stands for fermentable oligosaccharides, disaccharides, monosaccharides and polyols, a group of  short chain fermentable carbs which can cause distressing IBS-type symptoms.  The low FODMAP diet aims to exclude/reduce the amount of these in your daily foods and then try a slow introduction of each type to see which may be your symptom trigger.  This diet is only meant to be short-term as it’s very restrictive.

Red lentil curry coconut dahl

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A scrummy lentil recipe for you to try, plus some quirky facts that take the lowly lentil to an altogether new level.
This recipe’s become a fast favourite.  We’ve eaten it as part of a meze feast, as a side to fish & veg as well as a stand-alone with wild basmati rice and a huge bowl of crunchy mixed leafies.

Lentils have certainly come a long way since I first spied them decades ago, an overcooked brown mound heaped beside some dry nut roast.  It took the deliciously exotic recipes from Asia and the Middle East to spark my interest and open up all sorts of lentil possibilities.

They’ve actually come an even longer way.  Not just the oldest cultivated legume but they’re also mentioned in the bible.  And as I was wading through lentil articles online I stumbled upon a blog, ‘The History of Lentils’ that claimed archeologists found lentil artifacts dating back to 8000 BC from the banks of the Euphrates.
Lentil artifacts?!  Can’t imagine what that means, can you?  I think of artifacts being ancient urns, crudely made stone weapons or broken bits of corners of obscure things… but not lentils.  [I have, however, since learned that organic material, when found alongside ancient artifacts, do have a name: biofacts.  Who knew?]
Whatever this dig on the Euphrates banks found, I now have an image I can’t shake from my head of an ancient cooking pot with petrified lentils stuck to the base (‘coz we all know how easy it is to overcook & burn them, even back in the day…back in the ancient day).

At different times over the milennia, and in different global cultures, lentils have see-sawed between poor man’s supper and sumptuous king’s feast.  What’s remained steadfast and certain is that they’ve always been nourishing, packed with fibre and protein, B vitamins, iron, zinc, potassium…

If you’re thinking split lentils are the same as split peas because they look so similar, they’re not.  The name says it all.
Split peas come from dried field peas and lentils are seeds found in pods on small plants with branching vines that love dry, warm climates.  This is one reason they’ve not been traditionally grown here in UK (although this, too, has changed.  Hodmedod’s, a Suffolk company specialising in pulses, seeds and grains, were the first to successfully grow them back in 2017, and since then it seems everyone’s giving them a go).
Undoubtedly lentils’ first love must be the prairies, since Canada’s production and export of the not-so-lowly lentil far outstrips the rest of the world’s production by thousands of tons.

Lentils come in all sorts of colours, another reason to love them  – how many foods have this talent?  There’s black beluga here on the left of the photo (looking a little like caviar), and then various shades of brown, including the smaller puy ones (and a packet from Greece).  Plus green, red and yellow, and no doubt more I haven’t come across yet.

Pulses, even lentils, should be soaked overnight before rinsing and cooking in water.  Soaking, cooking and sprouting helps break down the oligosaccharides in the tough outer skin, that can cause bloating and gas for some.  Soaking also reduces the phytic acid, which can block absorption of important minerals in our foods.

The split red lentils in this recipe are smaller than the more common brown and green variety, and because they’ve been hulled (outer covering removed) and split, those hard-to-digest carbs have already been removed so they do not need soaking, just a rinse before cooking to ensure no small stones within are masquerading as lentils.
If you’re using canned pulses, give them a thorough rinse as they’ve been canned in firming agent, an additive that stops them turning to mush (another good reason to choose dried rather than canned).

Here’s the recipe and bravo for getting to the end of this lentil story.  I don’t know about you, but after discovering all these snippets I actually love this little pulse even more!

Ingredients

(serves 4 as a main)

100g dried red lentils
One 400 ml tin coconut milk
olive oil to gently fry:
3 large banana shallots, peeled and finely chopped
5 cms peeled fresh ginger,  grated
Optional: 1 red chilli, de-seeded and finely chopped (or dried chilli, as much as your tastebuds enjoy)
20 dried curry leaves, crumbled and stems removed
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground turmeric
1 tsp ground cumin
1 heaped tsp mild curry powder (or sharp if you want more zing)
200g very ripe tomatoes, or 200g from a 400g can tomatoes – OR 2 heaped tbsp tomato paste
a pinch of sea salt
500ml water, more or less (depends on what tomatoes you use)

Method

Pour the olive oil in a large pan and heat on medium.  Add the shallots until they’re transparent, not too coloured, then the grated ginger, chilli and curry leaves.
Stir through and heat for a few minutes.
Next add all the spices and chopped tomatoes (or paste) and the lentils.  Mix for another few minutes then pour in the coconut milk plus c 500ml water and that smidgeon of salt.  Check regularly as you may want to add more water if you used the tomato paste and not the fresh & juicier toms.

Bring to the boil then reduce the heat and let simmer for 20 minutes until the sauce thickens and the lentils are done.  Stir occasionally throughout to stop them becoming future lentil petrified artifacts!

Let me know if you love it too 🙂