Spinach-Cabbage Lentil Curry (Palakura-Cabbage Pappu kura)

I know the title is a little misleading, how can a dish be a pappu (dal) and a kura (curry). I wonder too!! My intention was to make a dry curry with moong dal, but ended up adding a little too much water as I wanted to make the curry in 30 minutes, but ended up with a very mushy dal. To add insult to injury none of the pictures I took came out good. But it tasted awesome. Well, in the spirit of blogging marathon, I’m going to post the recipe and the picture, but I’m going to redeem myself and make a better looking curry soon.

I usually make this curry with just spinach, but this time I only had half a bag of baby spinach, so I added half a head of cabbage to make enough curry for 3-4 servings.

Ingredients:
Spinach – 3 cups, chopped
Cabbage – ½ of a medium head, about 4 cups chopped
Moong dal (Pesarapappu) – ½ cup
Garlic – 2 cloves, roughly chopped
Green chilies – 2, slit vertically
Turmeric – ¼ tsp Salt – to taste

For tempering:
Urad dal (minapappu) – ½ tsp
Mustard seeds – ½ tsp
Cumin seeds – ½ tsp
Dry red chilies – 2, broken
Curry leaves – 8-10

Method:

• Soak moong dal in water for about 5-10 minutes (up to half an hour if you have time), in the mean time get the veggies ready.
• Heat 2tsp oil in a sauté pan, add tempering ingredients and once the seeds start to splutter add moong dal (drained), spinach and cabbage. Add turmeric and mix well.
• Cover and cook on medium flame stirring occasionally until dal is cooked through and cabbage is cooked through, should take about 15-20 minutes.
• Season with salt and cook for another minute. Serve with steamed rice or roti.

Usually there’s no need to add water to cook the lentils since if are soaked and both cabbage and spinach give out water while cooking. I wanted to finish the dish within 30 minutes, so added about ¼ cup of water along with the veggies which ended up making my dal too mushy. Ideally this is a dry curry where should be able to see the dal whole.

Lets see what my fellow marathoners have been cooking up for Day 5 of BM#5.
Curry in a hurry under 30 min: Aarthi, Divya, Jayashree, Kaveri, Pavani,
Seven Days of Indian Sweets:Gayathri, Priya Suresh,
Seven Days of Microwave Meals: Monika,
Seven Days of Regional Specials:Harini, Vaishali, Suma, PJ
Seven Days of Colorful Dishes Kid's Special: Kalyani
Summer Coolers: Jayasree, Kamalika, Srivalli