Khichdi is the favourite comfort food

There’s much to be said about a khichdi being everyone’s favourite comfort food. For the steaming hot goodness apart, the lentil and rice combined dish offers a healthy bite. “Yes,” agrees foodie Pinky Chandan-Dixit of Soam.

“It certainly makes for a complete one-pot meal that is  nutritionally balanced. It provides the right amount of fat and calories full of the goodness of carbohydrates from rice, protein from lentils and fibre, vitamins and minerals from vegetables.” 

Here are a few of her recipes to try at home...

Fada-ni-khichdi
Ingredients: n Ghee — 1 tbsp n Cumin — ½ tsp n Cloves — 2 n Cinnamon — 1 small piece n Asafoetida (hing), Turmeric, Haldi — ¼ tsp n Red chilli powder — ½ tsp n Salt — to taste
Method: Wash the broken wheat and dal together, then soak for sometime and leave aside. Heat ghee in a pressure cooker. Add the cumin, cloves, asafoetida and the vegetables. Add the chilli powder and turmeric powder, salt, dal and broken wheat. Now add in four cups of water and pressure cook for three  whistles. Open and add one tablespoon ghee and methiya keri masala (a readymade Gujarati spice mix).

Waghareli moong dal khichdi
Ingredients: n Moong dal, Rice — 1/2 cup
n Cumin — 1/2 tsp n Turmeic—a pinch
n Hing — 1/4 tsp n Onion — 1, small
n Tomato — 1, chopped, n Green chilli — chopped, 1 n Ghee — 1 tbsp
Method: Add the dal, rice, salt, turmeric and three cups of water to a pressure cooker. After three whistles, remove it. Do a little tempering with the ghee, cumin, hing, onion, green chilli and chopped tomato. Add the khichdi to this and then add a little salt to taste. Garnish with coriander. 

Temper it in different ways:
n Normally zeera is used to temper moong dal khichdi.
n The Maharashtrian way is to use with rye, kadipatta and dried red chillies.
n Punjabi’s make lassooni khichdi using garlic, ghee, zeera.
n You may use cloves and black pepper for that extra zest.

—Executive chef Arindam Bahel, Rodas