Organic Brown Lentils Uses Hints and Tips
Added on February 3rd, 2012
Found in Lentil Recipes, pulses
Organic Brown Lentils may look at bit boring on the shelf, but they are a highly versatile high protein ingredient that no kitchen should be without. Large, flat brown lentils that retain their shape well during cooking. Brown lentils are slightly stronger in flavour than green lentils, with a solid skin. Recently we had a spare 5kg bag of Organic Brown Lentils in the shop that were coming up to their sell by date, so this got me thinking, what do we do with these little brown gems.
- Dahl and Curry – as you would expect with any lentil they make a great ingredient for curries and with a very spices make a faboulous dahl, unlike red lentils they retain their shape after cooking, so the end dish has more texture. If you want a softer consistency soak your brown lentils for a couple of hours before cooking, or use a hand blender to get the consistency you want.
- Cook before – as with many pulses your freezer is your friend with organic brown lentils, we often cook a large patch and then freeze what we are not using now for later use. Frozen Organic Brown Lentils take a little tine to defrost, so remember to take them out of the freezer well in advance, we also freeze them in small batches so that they defrost more quickly.
- Add protein to a meal – you can use your organic brown lentils to add protein to a meal, they mix well with mince and as they are such an economical ingredient they can reduce your portion cost. Also as they can take the flavour of the dish well you may not notice the addition in the taste.
- Sprouting – there are many tips on how to sprout brown lentils on the web, and also loads of recipes of what to do with the sprouted lentils once you have them, one thing to remember is the brown lentils may take a little longer to sprout and don’t forget to be careful with hygiene when sprouting. Sprouting can be great fun for kids, but sometimes it is easier with some instructions and a sprouter kit.
- Salads – as brown lentils keep their shape when cooked they make a good protein element in many salads, but they will need to be combined with other ingredients to add extra interest, fresh herbs, in season beans and perhaps sliced sausage may work well.
- Vege Mince/Mix - we use Organic Brown Lentils as a key ingredient in our Vege Mince/Mix, for more information see our earlier blog.
- Collage – if you are at home on wet day and the kids are a bit bored and looking for something to do, how about making a collage, take some dried ingredients from the larger and large piece of paper and some glue, off you go make your own pictures, brown lentils make great collage material, they are flat, robost, don’t loose their colour and will cost pence to use.
In summary Organic Brown Lentils should be part of every kitchen store cupboard, they are great in curries, dahl, can be used to easily extend dishes using minced meat such as cottage pie, they can also be added to soups and casseroles. As these little gems keep well it is a really good idea to buy in bulk, which is much cheaper from Naturally Good Food.
Tags: mail order, organic brown lentils, sprouting, wholefood cooking
