Lentil koftas
Recipe originally published on a great French vegetarian-cuisine site, www.recettes-vegetariennes.com, to whom we offer a grand merci. Please see below for a word on units and their translation.
| quantity | ingredient | instruction |
| First, prepare this... | ||
| 1 | med. onion | Cut into pieces, then chop in a blender. |
| 2 | medium carrots | |
| 2 stalks | celery | |
| 2 | big garlic cloves | |
| 1 | green chili pepper (fresh or canned) | |
| 4 Tbsp | (olive) oil | Cook chopped vegetables 5 minutes, stirring regularly to prevent their burning. |
| 1 1/5 Tbsp | curry | Add and cook 1 minute. |
| 250 g (9 oz.) | coral lentils (orange) | |
| 600 ml (2 1/2 cups) | vegetable broth/bouillon | Add, mix and bring to boil. Reduce heat and cook gently (mijoter) 15-20 minutes (check instructions on lentil package) until lentils are tender. |
| 2 Tbsp | tomato paste | |
| Let lentil mix cool some. (Can be cooked ahead.) | ||
| 125 g (4.4 oz) | bread crumbs | Mix together gently. |
| 90 g (3.17 oz) | cashew nuts, finely chopped | |
| 2 Tbsp | chopped coriander (cilantro) or fragrant parsley | |
| 1 | egg, beaten lightly | |
| salt and pepper | Season. Amounts depend on how salty your vegetable bouillon is. | |
| Now for the fun part. First, pre-heat oven to 180°C (360°F). From the lentil mix, form balls about 4 cm in diameter and place them on a pastry sheet, either greased or non-stick. Since the mix is rather sticky (an understatement), one handy trick is to form the balls by using two spoons. Good luck and have fun! | ||
| Not too much | garam masala | Sprinkle over the koftas. Cook them in oven about 20 minutes, until they are lightly browned on the outside. |
| While the koftas are cooking, prepare the sauce. | 2 Tbsp | mango chutney | If chutney contains big lumps of mango, chop them up. Stir all together. | 375 g (13.2277357 ounces) | plain yogurt | 2 Tbsp | coriander (cilentro) or parsley leaves, chopped fine |
Serve koftas and sauce with hot naan (Indian bread). Bon appetit!
A word on units: When I translate a recipe from French, I always do it easily and assume that une cuillère à soupe, or soupspoon, is one Tablespoon (abbreviated Tbsp), and that one cuillère is one teaspoon (Tsp). The thing is that, in our kitchen, tablespoons and teaspoons from the USA are what we have to measure with. All other measures, though, we do in grams, liters or degrees Celsius, which we find much more practical than the English/American system, but let's not get into the reason here... I will try to give such units in both systems, If I forget, just email me.
In any case, you have a great units translator on your computer. Just open your Internet browser, such as Firefox or Internet Explorer (ugh), go to Google.com and type into the Google search box, e.g.:
180 degrees celsius in fahrenheit
or
190 grams in ounces
and voila! You'll notice that Google even guesses ahead at what you want, to simplify typing. This is not an ad for Google! The results can be pretty silly, as the examples above show.