Chickpea Dhansak Recipe

Jump to the recipe

I love Indian food, and this chickpea dhansak recipe is a perfectly healthy dish. Dhansak has elements of Persian and Gujurati cuisines and traditionally encompasses a meat such as mutton or goat cooked with lentils, vegetables and rice. This dhansak recipe uses the same principle but with none of the meat of course, making this dish vegetarian and vegan.

The sauce of the dhansak is made with red lentils that dissolve and become creamy and the blend of spices makes it a lovely comforting dish, with star anise being central to the sauce, cumin seed, garam masala, ground coriander and coriander leaf, turmeric, paprika and a squeeze of lemon to lift up the flavours. The result is a hearty, warm and delicious dish.

Chickpea Dhansak Recipe

Yield: 4 Servings

Difficulty: Easy

Cooking time: 35 Minutes

Print recipe

Pin recipe

Metric

US/Cups

Ingredients

• 4 tbsp sunflower oil
• 400 g chickpeas, cooked and drained
• 100 g red split lentils, dry
• 200 g chopped tomato or passata
• 400 ml water from a recently boiled kettle
• 1 medium onion
• 1 mild green chilli
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1 inch piece of ginger
• 1 tbsp garam masala
• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• 2 clove star anise
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• ½ tsp turmeric
• 2 tsp coriander leaves
• juice of half a lemon
• salt to taste

• 4 tbsp sunflower oil
• 14 oz chickpeas, cooked and drained
• 3½ oz red split lentils, dry
• 7 oz chopped tomato or passata
• 1¾ cups of water from a recently boiled kettle
• 1 medium onion
• 1 mild green chilli
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1 inch piece of ginger
• 1 tbsp garam masala
• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• 2 clove star anise
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• ½ tsp turmeric
• 2 tsp coriander leaves
• juice of half a lemon
• salt to taste

Instructions

1. Heat the oil in a saucepan and when the oil is moderately hot add the cumin seeds and star anise.
2. When the cumin is sizzling add the minced onion and green chilli and sweat until soft.
3. Mince or grate the garlic and ginger and sauté for a few minutes.
4. Add the tomatoes paprika, turmeric, ground coriander and garam masala.
5. Add in the lentils and water and stir well. Cover and simmer for 10 minutes stirring from time to time
6. Drain the chick peas and add them into the sauce. Simmer for another 10 minutes stirring every few minutes
7. Chop some coriander leaves and add them in together with the lemon juice
8. Stir well and leave to simmer gently until the lentils have almost disappeared into the sauce.
9. Serve with rice.

Do you like this recipe? Give it a rating!

4.13 from 8 reviews

Have you made this recipe?

If you make this recipe please share with the world! Post it on Instagram and tag @veggiegib and use the #veggiegib hasthag.

chickpeas / Indian Cuisine / lentils / main dish / vegan

2 responses to “Chickpea Dhansak Recipe”

1. Thanks, this is a good recipe. I love your spice mixture. I prepared this yesterday without using the oil and adding fresh pineapple. I love the mildly sweet taste provided from the addition of a whole fruit and the oil adds nearly 500 extra calories. While you cant temper spices in the same way without the oil you can dry fry carefully until fragrant and then saute using stock. It seems counter intuitive to add star anise but this spice adds a wonderful flavour to this curry. I would recommend this recipe!

   Reply

   • Thanks! The idea of adding pineapple sounds great, it must give a lovely sweetness. Will definitely try it sometime 🙂