Black-Eyed Pea Masala

love4culinary's Note:

This is a recipe that I adapted from a recipe my MIL made while I was in India. It is FABULOUS, and is even served for breakfast quite often in her house! (I could eat it for every meal LOL) I donut know the actual name of the chilies they use, but at home I generally use either 2 of the small chiles labeled "hot green chiles" from the market, or I use serranos. The ginger I generally just run over my microplane.

• Total Time: 2 hrs 25 mins
• Prep Time: 25 mins
• Cook Time: 2 hrs

Ingredients:

Servings: 8

• 1⁄3; cup vegetable oil or 1⁄3; cup ghee
• 1 -2 green chilies , minced
• 8 garlic cloves , minced
• 1 medium onion , diced
• 1 inch gingerroot , peeled and minced
• 4 ½ teaspoons curry powder or 4 ½ teaspoons garam masala
• 2 ½ teaspoons turmeric
• ½ teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 cup freshly chopped tomato
• salt , to taste
• 2 ½ cups dried black-eyed peas , soaked in water for 3-4 hours
• ½ cup plain yogurt
• 2⁄3; cup chopped cilantro

Directions:

1. Drain your peas.
2. Heat oil/ghee (allow to melt) in a medium heavy pot over medium heat and fry chiles, garlic, onion, and ginger for approx 6 minutes.
3. Add your curry powder/garam masala, turmeric and cumin, and then add the tomatoes.
4. Cook for approximately 3 minutes until it begins to thicken and add your peas and salt to taste, along with 4 cups of water.
5. Allow water to boil and then reduce your heat, cover and cook for approximately 2 hours until your peas are done and the sauce is nice and thick.
6. After the peas are done, fold in your yogurt (may wish to use a little more or little less to your tastes) and cilantro, and serve.
7. This goes well with rice or with chappati/roti.
8. Garnish with minced cilantro.

Reviews

[MargoH]

Love this! Delicious combination of flavors and spice. This has become a staple recipe in our house. I often use canned beans and add a sweet potato or two which works really well. Also have tried using less oil which works fine too. Can easily be extended to serve a few more by adding a little more yogurt or liquid.

[toohot4u]

This recipe completely exceeded my expectations! I made this for new years day, thinking it would be fun to have black eyed peas for the new year. I will be making this again before next year. I used half indian curry & half garam masala. This was a great slow cooked on the oven all day vegetarian dish that makes the house smell wonderful and you can't wait to eat. Next time I might experiment with chickpeas, I think that would be great too.

[LDL]

WOW - I just made my first Indian curry from scratch tonight following this wonderful recipe. 2 thumbs up for simplicity and fab taste. The house has the beautiful aroma's of the curry wafting through and I am excited!! I, too, cut back on the ghee/oil. As I didn't have green chilli's , I used red instead otherwise used all ingredients shown in recipe. The only step I changed was in step 2, before frying the chillis, garlic, onion and ginger I threw these ingredients in a food processor with some oil and blended it too a paste. Then I threw this mixture into pot with a mixture of oil and ghee. Otherwise , I followed the recipe too a tee. THANK YOU, THANK YOU for a wonderful dish. I could easily cook this up on a weekly basis and have it part of our main meals. As its now 11pm while I type this, I have to wait until dinner tomorrow night to enjoy with hubby. (He did comment, just before he went to bed, that whatever I was cooking smelled YUMMO!) This is a keeper in our household....