Dal Ma Sabut Peshawari

Method

Soak Urad dal and Rajma (separately, after washing them thoroughly) overnight.

Place the lentils in a thick bottomed mid sized degh, along with a tbsp of ghee , a tsp each of salt, haldi, coriander powder, lal mirch, half inch pc of diced ginger & about 10 cloves of diced garlic. Put the degh, covered, on a wood/coal fired chulha, and let it simmer for a few hours till the lentils are absolutely soft. Take the degh off the stove and let it rest for half an hour.

Take another similar degh, put on the fired chulha & add the remaining ghee. When the ghee is hot enough, add the remaining garlic (crushed in a pestel) & let fry till just before the garlic starts turning golden. At this point, add the remaining ginger (diced), Coriander powder, haldi, Kashmiri mirch and tomato puree. When the mix has been cooking for about 10 minutes, and the ghee has floated to the top, it is time to add the drained water from the cooked dal to this degh. While this heats up and come to the boil, one should smash the pulses left in the other degh with a wooden spatula preferably or with the back of a heavy kadchi (ladle). Mercilessly crush this mix to an almost a paste form, and add to the simmering/boiling mix in the 2nd degh. Again, bring it to the boil and let simmer for an hour till everything is blended well together. Adjust the thickness of the dal, and add more water if needed. Check for the seasoning and adjust. Serve.

Another, albeit modern, twist to the method is to pressure cook the lentil mix (in the first stage) for half an hour at full pressure. This does the same job, with a significant savings in time & fuel, but one loses out some in terms of the woody, smoky flavour imbibed by the dish in the longer process.