Moroccan Spiced Lentils Recipe

Moroccan Soup

SPICED LENTILS

INGREDIENTS

1 1/3 cups red lentils
2 1/2 cups vegetable broth
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/2 tablespoon coriander
1 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon turmeric

2 onions
1 tablespoon butter
2 small tomatoes

PREPARATION

Put lentils and broth in pot. Add cayenne, coriander, cumin, ginger, pepper, salt, and turmeric. Soak for 4 hours. Lentils should be split. (Hey, if you want some to leave slowly, you could say, “Make like a lentil and split.”)

While the lentils soak, go outside and pull weeds. When you come back, dice your onions and tomatoes. After your lentils have been sufficiently soaked (and how often does that phrase come up in normal conversation?) add onion and butter to pan. Sauté the onions on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until the onions are tender. (Love me tender, love me true.)

Put onions and tomatoes in pot. Bring soup to boil. Turn heat down to low and simmer for 30-to-60 minutes or until lentils are tender. Serve to adoring family or guests who are about to go Morocco mad.

TIDBITS

1) You know, if I had a time machine this tidbit would have already been written.

2) Or maybe I’d use my time machine to always go back to the moment all my clothes were clean. I’d never have to do laundry again.

3) I think I’d go back to the moment when that Viking, Haarald, was about to invent lutefisk and give him a crunchy-shell taco. The culinary world would have been better off.

4) Oh, and the rest of the too. Eating lutefisk was the main reason the Norsemen assaulted England and continental Europe for centuries. I mean who wouldn’t feel like killing and pillaging after eating lutefisk?

5) Fortunately, the Vikings eventually came into contact with Moroccans in Spain. While bad for the inhabitants who had to suffer through countless battles to-ing and fro-ing across their backyards, it was a positive boon to the rest of Europe.

6) For once the fierce Norsemen discovered the spices of Morocco, they could preserve their food. They didn’t have to soak their fish in lye, a poison, to preserve it. They could even make Berbere shish kabobs. This made them very happy.

7) And the raids of the Scandanavian beserkers ended. Well okay not right away, but they did tail off.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.