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Laucki Chana Dal (Bottle Gourd, Ghiya, Doodhi)
February 8th, 2010 filed under Dal (Lentils), Vegan
Laucki chana dal is a healthy main dish and has both vegetable and lentil making a wholesome meal.
Ingredients
- 1 medium bottle gourd (laucki, ghiya, doodhi)
- 1/2 cup yellow split gram (chana dal)
- 2 tablespoon oil
- 1/2 tsp cumin seeds (jeera)
- A pinch of asafetida (hing)
- 2 whole red chilies
- 1 teaspoon shredded ginger (adrak)
- 1/4 tsp turmeric powder (haldi)
- 1/2 tsp red chili powder adjust to taste
- 1/2 teaspoon Salt adjust to taste
- 1/2 teaspoon of garam masala (optional)
- 1 teaspoon mango powder (amchoor) adjust to taste
- About 2 tablespoon finally chopped cilantro (hara dhania)
- 1 cup of water adjust as needed
Method
- Wash and soak chana dal for 1 hour or more.
- Peel, wash and cut bottle gourd into ½ inch cubes.
- Heat the oil in a saucepan. Test the heat by adding one cumin seed to the oil; if seed cracks right away oil is ready.
- Add the cumin seeds as they crack add asafetida, and whole red chilies stir for few seconds.
- Next add ginger, turmeric, and chili powder and stir for few seconds.
- Add gram (chana dal), bottle gourd, salt and 1cup of water. Water can be adjusted as needed as some time bottle guard will have more or less moisture and depends how much gravy one prefers.
- Cook till gram dal (chana dal) gets soft.
- Turn off the heat and add mango powder, garam masala, and cilantro. Stir and cover the pan for few minutes before serving.
Serving suggestion
Serve with roti or paratha or with plain rice.
Variations
- Mango powder can be replaced with lemon juice.
- Add 2 tablespoon of dry fenugreek leaves or 2 tablespoons of fresh chopped fenugreek leaves same time adding the bottle gourd.
Can we make this in coconut gravy?
Hi Kavita,
It should taste good; I am not used to use much coconut in cooking.
Hello Aunty
We can use wet shredded coconut grind with red chilli powder alongwith some water and we can add that coconut paste at time of adding water, this will also give thickness to the recipe.
This was great. I like it spicy so I added more chili powder and chilies. I could find thae gourd so I used green squash.
The one thing I couldn’t do – get the dal tender (even after soaking for an hour) before the squash gets too soft. The second time I made it I added the squash about half way through the cooking process.
All I can say is Manjula rocks. The recipes are simple, quick, and fantastic!
Soak the dal in hot water. That will help.
I do it with moong dal instead of channa dal
hey,cool …looking nice…here is my slow cooker version of the same recipe…
http://richaskitchen.blogspot.com/2010/01/chana-dallentil-with-lauki.html
Hey Manjula, the recipe looks great. Do you think the Gord could be replaced with pumpkin or other types of Squash?
Cool entry I just Love it, Keep adding more like this!
Looks good. I’m curious, are you not supposed to cook the amchoor powder much, is that why you add it at the end with the garam masala? Does cooking it change the flavor of it?
Thanks for the recipe..I always used to add coriander powder and never liked it..Now,I will try this as per your recipe…Looks great..