Ingredients

1. Toor dal (arhar dal) - 3/4 cup
2. Turmeric powder - 1 tsp
3. Tomatoes (chopped) - 4 medium size
4. Onion (chopped) – 1/2 (optional)
5. Garlic cloves – 2
6. Methi leaves - 2 cups or 100 gms
7. Green chillies (slit) - 7
8. Water - 2 1/2 cups
9. Oil - 1 tsp
10. Cumin powder (optional) – 1/2 tsp

Tadka (tempering)

11. Oil – 1 1/2 tbsp
12. Onion (sliced) - 1 small
13. Garlic (crushed or chopped finely) - 3 to 4 cloves
14. Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
15. Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
16. Dry chillies (broken in 2 pieces) - 3
17. Curry leaves - 20

Method

1. Pluck only the leaves of methi (fenugreek) from the stems. Wash thoroughly with water (atleast 2 to 3 times) to remove all the dirt and other impurities. Drain the water from the methi leaves and keep aside.
2. Take a pressure cooker, add dal, onion, tomatoes, green chillies, garlic, methi leaves (as is or chopped), water 2 1/2 cups, turmeric powder, cumin powder and oil and close the lid and cook it until your dal is completely cooked ,after few whistles or till dal is soft.
3. Let it rest for few minutes, till the pressure of cooker comes down.
4. Then open the lid and mash it nicely all garlic, green chillies, onion, dal, methi leaves, should be mixed well.
5. If the dal is dry, then add 3/4th cup water according to your consistency, how much thick or thin you want.
6. Now add salt and mix well.

Tadka

7. Now heat another vessel, for tadka add oil, let it get warm, now add mustard seeds, cumin seeds, when it splutters add onion and fry till soft and light brown, add garlic, dry chillies and curry leaves, stir well, after few seconds when the garlic is light brown, switch it off .
8. If you want you can avoid onion and garlic and keep the tadka ingredients to a minimum.
9. Add this to the dal or add dal in this vessel, mix soon, and close the lid quickly, so that tadka's aroma is well blended with the dal.
10. Serve it with rice and drizzle of ghee on top or roti. I have served this with prawn fry/era varuval.

Notes

1. The amount of water added in a cooker should not exceed the limit of pressure cooker, otherwise it will come out.
2. When it starts boiling tsp oil is added, so that boiling should not come outside the pressure cooker, the froth of dal.
3. Never add salt, in a dal during cooking, otherwise it will take more time to cook, always add salt in the last, after cooking.
4. You can decrease or increase methi leaves quantity, according to your taste.
5. In tadka you can avoid onions and can use the rest of the ingredients.
6. Usually in every dal, my mother adds jeera - methi powder (cumin and fenugreek seeds powder), if it is not there can add just cumin powder or can avoid it.
7. You can add any thing in your tadka and in the dal while boiling; sometimes I just add turmeric powder, tomatoes, and green chillies and boil it.
8. With the same ingredients you can make methi (fenugreek) dal, mango dal, kacchi mirchi ki dal(green chillies dal).
9. When I add Methi leaves with the dal (together), it takes lot of time to cook the dal soft. I always cook my dal in a pressure cooker so that it cooks quickly and saves me time. I always include all the things at a time in the pressure cooker and cook it. But when I add Methi leaves with the dal to the pressure cooker, it takes a bit longer to cook. So, if you want to save more time you can cook the dal and the methi leaves separately.