Spinach with yellow peas and moong dal

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With school closed for so many days, I have been in full cleaning mode.  Cleaned my pantry, got my husband to clean up the bills and various statements we receive, had my younger son clean his closet,  all of us cleaned the garage, and today, I worked on my freezer. 

Spinach with yellow peas

I tend to use my freezer a lot.  When I have a lot of leftovers, I put them in either airtight containers or in the freezer safe Ziploc bags and save them for a day when I am scrambling to make dinner.

Sometimes though, I forget what I have saved.  And it helps to have days like today when I have time to go through and take stock of the food I have saved up for a rainy day.  It was mostly things I knew I had – only a couple of surprises – some bisibele bath, and about a cup or so of boiled yellow peas.

I had chopped up some baby spinach and was going to make it like I normally do – with moong dal.  With the discovery of frozen yellow peas, I decided to change up the recipe a bit.  It came out great!

Here is what you need

• ¾ cup moong dal
• 1 cup cooked yellow peas (soak dried peas for 5 hours or so – pressure cook with a bit of salt, turmeric powder and hing - asafoetida, till peas are cooked)
• 1 lb. baby spinach, washed and chopped
• salt to taste
• 2 tsp. oil
• ½ tsp mustard seeds
• 1 tsp. cumin seeds
• 2 red chilies
• ½ medium onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped
• ½” ginger, minced
• 1 tsp. rasam powder

Here is how I made it:

1. Pressure cook the moong dal on low heat for about 7 – 8 minutes after the first whistle.  Set aside
2. If you have left over cooked yellow peas, you can use that, if not please boil the peas until cooked.
3. Add enough water to the spinach and cook on medium heat till the spinach is wilted.  Drain most of the water out and return to the stove.
4. Add the moong dal, yellow peas, and salt.  Let this simmer on low heat.
5. In the mean time, heat oil in a skillet.  Add the mustard seeds and cumin seeds.
6. When the mustard seeds sputter, add the red chilies, and fry for 30 seconds.
7. Add the chopped onions, garlic, and ginger.  Fry till the onions turn translucent. 
8. Add the rasam powder and fry for a couple of minutes.  If you don't have rasam powder, add a little bit of chili, cumin, and coriander powders instead.
9. Add this to the spinach.  Let it simmer for five more minutes.

Serve hot with rice or rotis.