For Lunch Today, Tomorrow and Maybe the Next

This is take two of our experimentation with Anupy Singla’s new book, The Indian Slow Cooker.

We had so much success with our first dish, we were eager to try something new.

Here’s what I learned:

A. It’s really important to have the right ingredients.

B. Sometimes it’s OK to improvise.

C. This cookbook is excellent for helping pull together really large meals with multiple sides…especially if you have a couple crock pots to spare.

Indian food has always been pretty intimidating to me. So when I first heard that Anupy was writing this book, I knew it would be for me. It’s already made cooking Indian food at home a part of our flavor rotation.

This weekend, I tried two new recipes from the book, the “simple” yellow lentils and the spicy cauliflower and potatoes.

Both were super easy to prepare and plop in the crock pot. But it was clear after about 5 hours with the lentils that I didn’t have the correct split yellow lentils. They never broke down like I was expecting. So to get a smoother, creamy consistency, I just plunged in an immersion blender. Voila, creamy lentils.

The cauliflower was a little trickier. I was expecting, per the book’s instructions, for these to be ready in three hours. But even after three-and-a-half hours, the spices hadn’t combined like I was expecting. So I let them go a little longer and shifted our plans for an Indian feast to the next day.

Turns out a night in the fridge was just what these needed. By the time I reheated the next day, the flavors were just right…for us anyway.

I served these hearty veggie and legume dishes with basmati rice, garlic naan and some chicken chunks simmered in an off-the-shelf tikka masala sauce.

Really good. I also learned that Future Farmgirl is a big tikka masala fan. It’s a start.