Easy Indian vegetarian dishes deliver big flavour

Chef believes in veggie dishes that deliver big flavour with little effort

On one of the hottest days so far this summer, I sizzled a handful of spices and chilies, softened some flaked coconut and wilted two generous bunches of greens.

After puréeing, adding to turmeric-simmered lentils and finishing with a tadka of mustard seeds and red chilies, I ended up not just with dinner, but a tonic. Refreshing and bright, it proved to be the perfect antidote to the sweltering heat.

“It’s such a simple recipe and I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before,” says Chetna Makan, author of four cookbooks and former Great British Bake Off semifinalist.

One of more than 80 recipes in her latest book, Chetna’s Healthy Indian: Vegetarian (Octopus Books, 2020), the recipe for spinach and coconut dal exemplifies her approach to plant-based cooking.

She believes in maximum impact with minimal effort and is adept at using pulses, produce and spices to their fullest.

“My aim is to help you feel more confident using veg and become a little more experimental with pulses,” she writes.

Makan, who lives in a seaside town in Kent, England, moved from Mumbai in the early 2000s. As with her previous work, she found inspiration for Chetna’s Healthy Indian: Vegetarian in her homeland.

While Makan’s second cookbook, Chai, Chaat & Chutney (2017), took her to India’s four largest cities — Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai and Delhi — in pursuit of a wide array of street foods, this time she took a more localized approach with a single trip to Delhi.

After Makan put out a call on social media, seven passionate home cooks hailing from different parts of the country invited her into their kitchens.

“It was crazy how it happened — they were so welcoming. I was born and brought up in India, so I know it very well. But I was really surprised by everybody’s generosity and openness,” she says.

“I asked them, ‘Don’t cook before I come. Cook whatever you want, but cook it in front of me.’ Because it’s very different to actually hear them tell me a recipe rather than seeing it. It’s very, very different. There are no measurements, so they’ll say, ‘Oh, just put a sprinkle of this and a pinch of this.’ ”

When Makan wrote the original Chetna’s Healthy Indian (2019), she didn’t intend for it to become the first in a series. But after such a positive reception, it became clear to both her and her publisher that there was an appetite for more of Makan’s “effortlessly good for you” meals.

A followup focusing on vegetarian and vegan options was a natural next step, she says, given an increased interest in plantbased eating, as well as a growing number of questions from her followers on social media.

As a child in Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, Makan “was brought up on delicious vegetarian cooking.” Her dad is vegetarian, and although she eats chicken and fish on occasion, she enjoyed concentrating solely on vegetables in her latest work for one very simple reason — flavour.

“You can cook all the meat you want, but at the end of it, it tastes like meat. You can add different spices, of course, and it will taste a bit different, but the core is still meat,” says Makan.

“Whereas with vegetables and other vegetarian (ingredients), everything you cook is different. Cauliflower has a different flavour. Spinach has a different flavour. Lentils have a different flavour.

“The flavour is so different, which is what I love because you cannot play with flavours this vastly or this intensely in meat. Even if you don’t add anything — if you just cook with basic spices — it’s going to taste amazing.”

You cannot play with flavours this vastly or this intensely in meat.