As with most bigger lentils and beans, you need to soak the Urad Dal about half an hour before you start cooking. They get a bit softer and won’t need as much time in boiling.

Take a pot and give the water into it, additionally the Urad Dal and place the pot on the stove, bringing the water to a boil. Now boil the lentils until they are soft, which will take about half an hour. Stir from time to time, so that they don’t stick to the bottom of the pot.

In the meantime, you can wash the tomatoes and cut them into small pieces. Peel the ginger and cut it into tiny pieces, so that you have about half a tablespoon of fresh ginger pieces. Check on your dal from time to time and after about thirty minutes, you can try to squeeze it to see whether it is soft. As soon as the lentils are soft, take the pot off the stove.

The next step is to prepare the tarka, which is the mixture of spices. Heat up the ghee in a pan. When the ghee is hot, add the cumin seeds, the asafetida, coriander, turmeric and finally the fresh ginger. Stir, so that the spices can develop their aroma but don’t burn to the pan. Once they have turned their colour and your kitchen smells wonderfully, add the tomatoes. Let them get cooked well while stirring from time to time. In this way, the tomatoes get soft and the spices get mixed into them.

Once your tomatoes are fully soft, nearly in a puree-like state, you can take them off the stove and mix them into your dal. Add salt according to taste and, if you like, put some freshly washed coriander leaves on top of your dish for decoration.

Enjoy!