Tadka Daal with Egg (Green lentil curry with egg)

One of my favorite lentil curries to eat with naan or chapatti is the green moong daal. As many Indians are aware, this dish is a Punjab (Northern India)specialty and is available widely in the dhabas (roadside eat-outs) along the highways. I still remember as a kid, how I wished our driver stopped our car near one of those, to get some water or for something else and I could get the chance of coaxing my dad to get a plate of this absolutely delicious curry. Over the years, I developed the cooking style for this dish in different ways and this version to some extent let me connect to that roadside experience.

Ingredients:

For the Daal(Curry):

• Green Moong (whole) – 1 cup
• Rajma (kidney beans) – 1/3rd cup
• Onions – 3/4th medium Julienned
• Garlic – 3 cloves sliced finely
• Ginger – ½” piece grated
• Tomato (fresh) – ½ medium chopped fine.
• Turmeric – ½ tsp
• Cumin seeds – 1 tsp
• Red chilli powder(optional) – ½ tsp
• Green chillies(Thai or Indian) – 1 to 2 chillies chopped fine.
• Kasoori Methi(Dried fenugreek leaves) – 1 tbsp
• Cilantro – 1/3rd cup chopped
• Garam Masala – 1 tsp
• Salt to taste
• Ghee(optional) – ½ tsp
• Oil for cooking

For the Egg:

• Eggs – 2
• Onion and Garlic paste – ½ tbsp
• Salt to taste

Method:

• Wash and soak both the green moong and rajma overnight
• Boil the daal mentioned above with salt until they are done.
• Heat oil in a pan and add the cumin seeds and wait for them to splutter.
• Add the onions and fry till they change color.
• Add the garlic and ginger to it and stir fry them. Be careful not to burn the garlic.
• After a couple of minutes or so, add the tomato and fry well.
• Add the turmeric, red chilli powder , green chillies and cook until oil starts surfacing up.
• Add the daal at this point and mix well. During this process take a ladle or spoon and mash the daal here and there. This would give a texture to the curry.
• Now add the kasoori methi to it and simmer while you prepare the eggs separately.
• To prepare the eggs, whisk the two eggs along with the onion-garlic paste in a bowl.
• Take a small pan and heat a little oil in it.

• Add the egg mixture and stir briskly to scramble very fine.
• Once the eggs are semi-crispy, add it to the simmering daal.
• Add hot water to the daal if it looks too thick.
• Now add the garam masala and ghee. Adjust the salt if needed.
• Garnish it with cilantro and serve with hot Indian breads like chapatti or naan.

Notes:

• If you are a vegetarian or in a mood for it, you can skip the entire process of adding the egg to the daal.
• Also, in earlier days I used to drop the whisked eggs directly to the simmering daal. This is slightly tricky but works fine. In this case the eggs should be seasoned with salt and pepper only. The method is to stir the daal fast as you slowly pour in the whisked eggs. This will automatically form broken strings of eggs in the daal. However, over the years I found out that scrambling separately has a little more advantage in terms of flavor. Also, one could taste the eggs a little more then what I call the “egg-drop” method.