Turmeric Is Your Friend

I have a big cabinet full of many kinds of spices. In an effort to use them while they are still fresh I am always looking for new recipes. Russ is also on the lookout for foods he wants me to make him. There are not enough days in the month, let alone meals that he is actually home for me to make everything that he requests. I draw the line at the outrageously fattening ones, but he usually only shows me the healthy ones.
Russ read somewhere about the benefits of turmeric. Things like anti inflammatory and mood boosting properties sounded good to me. As with all these nutritional kind of claims I am sure I would have to eat way more than one turmeric based dish every few days to really have it make a difference, but since we all love Indian food in our house and turmeric is the spice that gives curry it’s yellow color I thought it is worth trying to use it more.
I also often get requests for vegan dishes and this one happens to not include any animal products so it is serving many purposes and it tastes great.
Yellow lentils with Turmeric
1 lb bag of yellow lentils (also known as yellow split peas)

2 t. Ground turmeric

2 T. Vegetable oil

2 Cinnamon sticks

2t. Cumin seeds

5 whole cloves

1 t. Smoked paprika

4 scallions minced

3 chile peppers minced (seed them to reduce heat)

5 garlic cloves minced

2 inches of fresh ginger root -grated

1 pint of cherry tomatoes- halved

1 T. Honey

Juice of a lemon

Chopped cilantro to garnish
Put the lentils in a colander and rise in cold running water for a few minutes. Place the lentils in a pan with four cups of cold water and the turmeric. Bring to a boil and reduce to simmer and cook until the lentils are soft, about 45 mins. Stir every so often and make sure they are not sticking to the bottom of the pan. If you need to add more water do so, but you don’t want it to be watery when they are soft.
In a separate small fry pan out the oil and the cinnamon sticks, cloves. Cook on medium heat for three minutes, add the cumin seeds cook another two minutes. Take the cloves out since there is nothing worse that biting a whole clove when you don’t expect it.
Add the paprika, scallions, garlic, chiles and ginger. Cook another three minutes. Add this spice oil mixture to the yellow lentils. Stir in the cherry tomatoes, honey and lemon juice. Taste and add salt and pepper. Let everyone add their own cilantro since you only want to add it as a garnish.