Dal Makhani is a popular north Indian dish that has its origin in Punjab. It literally means ‘buttery lentils’. It is supposed that the original Dal makhani recipe has only black gram lentil (urad) in it. Makhani means buttery and so it is butter and cream along with urad dal. As per Wikipedia, Dal Makhani became popular after the partition, thanks to the Punjabi diaspora. It is a typical punjabi dish that can be found in almost all Dhabas (roadside eateries, very popular in North India) and in Indian restaurants here in the US.
There are so many varieties of sauces like cashew, tomato, white sauce, curry sauce, rogan josh, buna, madrasi etc and Makhani is one among them. Through out my experience with cooking different dishes, I have noticed that most often cooking a recipe can be broadly defined as first preparing a sauce/gravy and then adding the main ingredient, the one that defines the dish, to it. This method of preparation of dishes is particularly useful in restaurants where a variety of sauces are prepared first and then different recipes are cooked using those sauces. And Dal Makhani is prepared the same way as well; you first prepare the Makhani and then add lentil (urad dal here) to it.
Dal Makhani is a very rich and flavorful dish. This is mainly because of the lentils which gives you a fullness when eaten due to the high protein content. Hence it is a healthy dish as well. Dal Makhani goes well with almost all entree items like rice, chappati, paratha, naan etc. Also, it is very easy to make. So without further delay, go prepare this easy and tasty punjabi dish in your kitchen and let me know your comments 🙂
- Black gram dal – 1 cup
- Ginger garlic paste – 1 tbsp
- Kashmiri red chilli powder – 1 ¼ tbsp
- Unsalted butter – 5 tbsp (120 gr)
- Tomato, large, pureed – 2 ½ nos (pureed to 1 cup)
- Fresh cream – 4 to 5 tbsp (250 gr)
- Salt as required
- Soak dal in water for 8 hours or overnight.
- Rub the dal using your two hands and filter the skins. Repeat this for 5 to 8 times until 70% of the skin is removed.
- Add 3 cups of water and ½ tsp salt and pressure cook the dal for 5 whistles.
- Transfer the dal into a thick bottomed non stick sauce pan and bring them to boil. Add ginger garlic paste, chilli powder and butter. Cook until the butter is melted, mixed and well blended.
- Add in tomato puree and fresh cream. Mix well and add enough salt.
- Bring the dal makhani to boil in a low to medium flame. Cook for around 20 to 25 minutes until a thin glaze is formed at the top.
- Serve it hot with a dollop of butter on top. It goes excellent with naan, rotis and other Indian flat bread varieties.
- Heat a sauce pan with a tbsp of oil. Add in roughly chopped tomatoes and very little salt. Sauté until oil seperates.
- Allow it to cool and make a thick puree adding very little water.
2.Use non stick pan to make this dal makhani dish to avoid the dal sticking at the bottom.
3.could also add rajma and other kinds of dal to this dish. i have tried both and all tasted equally good.
