Palak Daal

This is a great recipe to make on Sundays for the whole week because it's easy to make in a large quantity and the flavors gets better every day (it also reheats very well). My recipe is an adaptation of the one from 101cookbooks (one of my favorite food blogs - check it out). You have a lot of leeway in the spicing here, so feel free to tweak based on how spicy you like thing. I tend to slightly underspice when I'm making the whole recipe and then individually spice each bowl as I eat it so I can add exactly the right amount (it can be hard to spice a giant pot of food because you won't get all the peppers and spices distributed totally evenly), but you can also just do the whole pot if you don't want to mess with adding spices each meal.

This recipe makes about 8 large servings, so feel free to cut in half. I recommend serving with brown rice, but you could also serve with naan or plain.

Ingredients
1.5 cups / 9.75 oz lentils, picked over and rinsed [the original recipe says to use "white urid/ ivory lentils, I have never found them, so I've used regular lentils and yellow split peas, both of which turned out great, I think french green lentils would also work too]
9 cups water, plus more if necessary
1 lb. spinach, washed and chopped
1.5 Tbsp ginger, peeled and finely chopped
3/4 tsp turmeric
1.5 jalapeno pepppers, minced (plus more for garnishing)
3 plum tomatoes, chopped
3/4 tsp salt
2 Tbsp butter (you could probably substitute vegan margarine/olive or canola oil to make it vegan)
3/4 tsp cumin seeds
1.5 tsp red chile powder
juice of 1/4 a lemon
3/4 cup cilantro, chopped

Equipment

Cutting board and large knife

Large pot (ideally thick bottomed so things don't burn)

Stirring spoon or silicone spatula

Small saucepan

Instructions

1. In a large pot over medium-high heat combine the lentils and water, and bring to a boil.

2. While the water boils, work on chopping your spinach, ginger, tomatoes, and jalapenos. [Word of warning on chopping jalapenos - use rubber gloves or put your hand inside a plastic bag as you cut them up so your hands don't start burning, and especially if you have contact lenses, because taking lenses out with small amounts of capsaicin left under your fingernails is a highly unpleasant experience and permanently wrecks your lenses. Also, you should discard all the seeds and the white part the seeds are attached too - all you want is the green exterior.] If you're using baby spinach, you don't need to chop as finely because it will already be in smaller tender leaves, but if you're using spinach with thicker stems and leaves, chop it more finely. [Another note: you can and should store your ginger root in a Ziplock in the freezer. It will keep the ginger fresh much longer, and frozen ginger is way easier to peel and cut into nice shavings that mince into tiny bits.]

3. When the water is boiling, add the spinach, ginger, turmeric, jalapenos, and tomatoes.Reduce the heat, put the top on, and simmer for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. If things start to dry out, add more water, but as long as the pot is covered, that probably won't happen.

4. Towards the end of the simmering time, heat the butter and cumin in a saucepan over medium heat and fry until the cumin seeds start to pop (this is what the instructions say, sometimes they don't pop, maybe the seeds are old or something, so after 30 seconds or so of the butter being hot and melted, if nothing happens, go on). Add the red chile powder and fry for another 30 seconds.

5. Add this butter mixture to the lentils along with the salt and allow to cook for another five minutes.

6. Taste, and season with more salt or other spices if needed. If you care more about ease than prettiness, you can add the chopped cilantro now and stir into the daal, where it will promptly wilt. If you are going to eat most of the daal now, you can serve it into bowls and top with chopped cilantro (and a little bit of extra jalapeno if you like it very spicy), which is a prettier presentation. Otherwise, let it cool some, then put into containers to refrigerate or freeze.