Instant Akha Masoor

People who have experienced the joy of eating at the road side dhabas in India would need no introduction of this dish. But for the rest  - There is nothing like Akha Masoor on the rainy, gloomy, sunny, chilli ... ohh leave it;on any day :-) My absolute favorite .. Well I personally feel some vegetables in the kitchen don't gel with some of its counter parts and so is Masoor and Onion. So when I made it I decided to make variation to the traditional recipe by leaving onion out and using mere ingredients. Believe me I never looked back; I found my perfect yet instant recipe.

The secret ingredients - 1 spoon tomato puree ( I use Kroger's ), 3-4 curry leaves, 2-3 garlic pods.

Boil 1 cup whole masoor in the pressure cooker. The best part of masoor is you don't have to soak it unless you need to sprout it.

In a pan add 1 tbs Olive oil, once hot add mustard seeds. Once they start to sputter add chopped garlic. Let it turn golden brown. Add chopped curry leaves and tomato puree. Add boiled masoor. Put pinch of turmeric and 1 sp red chili powder. Add 1 cup water and let it boil for 8 to 10 minutes. The curry thickens as you boil it.

This goes very well with roti as well as rice. If you are wondering what is the foil doing in the pic. I just had wrapped chapatis in it to keep it hot till we eat it :-) .. hot chapatis just double the taste!!