This flavorful vegan soup is a crowd-pleaser, and contains no added salt or oil.
Indian Dal Soup
- Prep Time: 20 mins
- Cook Time: 60 mins
- Total Time: 1 hour 20 mins
- Yield: About 6 cups soup (4 hearty bowls) 1x
Ingredients
- 5 cups water
- ½-1 onion, diced
- 1 ½ teaspoons grated ginger
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon cumin
- ½ teaspoon nutmeg
- ½ teaspoon cardamom seed powder
- ½ teaspoon ancho chili powder
- 1 cup red lentils
- 1 15-ounce can no-salt garbanzo beans
- 1 14.5-ounce can no-salt diced tomatoes
- 2 cups Yukon Gold potatoes, diced (2-3 medium potatoes)
- 2 cups fresh Lacinato/dinosaur kale, cut into ¼ inch strips
- 3 tablespoons ground, hulled sesame seeds
- ¼ cup fresh basil, chopped finely
Instructions
- Place ¼ cup of the water into a large soup pot and sauté the onion for a few minutes.
- Add the ginger, garlic powder, cumin, nutmeg, cardamom and chili powder, and mix well.
- Add the remaining water, lentils, garbanzos, tomatoes and potatoes.
- Bring to a boil, reduce heat, cover and simmer for 45 minutes, until lentils are tender.
- Just before serving, add the last three ingredients: the kale, ground sesame seeds and basil, and cook for an additional 10 minutes.
Notes
To grind the sesame seeds, use a small coffee grinder.
Substitutions: yellow or red onion may be used.
If you don’t have any of the spices, just leave them out; the soup will still taste great, just more mild.
Red lentils can be found in the bulk section at Whole Foods.
Be sure to buy “no-salt-added” beans (Eden brand) and tomatoes if you are not cooking your own beans from dry or using fresh tomatoes.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: ¼ recipe (about ⅕ cups soup)
- Calories: 426
- Sugar: 5.2g
- Sodium: 96.1mg
- Fat: 6.6g
- Saturated Fat: 0.9g
- Carbohydrates: 73.7g
- Fiber: 13.9g
- Protein: 22.4g
- Cholesterol: 0
(Adapted from drmcdougall.com recipe for Hearty Dal Soup, 2007.)
If you make this recipe and enjoy it, please share a comment below or on my Facebook page. If you'd like to print this recipe, use the green "Print" button near the top-right of the recipe. Learn more about the Straight Up Food Cookbook here. Thank you!
Thank you Cathy! I just made a pot of this soup and it is EXCELLENT! Great creamy texture from the red lentils, and good flavor. It is very mildly spicy. Next time I am going to also add a little bit of a chili that is hotter than ancho.
I cooked it in my pressure cooker - followed instructions, except where it says "...simmer for 45 minutes..." Instead, bring up to high pressure in a pressure cooker and cook for 6 minutes on high. Used natural pressure release. Then added the greens, basil and sesame and simmered the last 10 minutes without pressure. It turned out perfectly.
Recipe maked a lot. How well do you think it would freeze, Cathy?
Hi Pam, I've heard that potatoes don't freeze that well, that their texture is different after freezing; but I'd give it a try anyway 🙂 Thanks for the pressure cooker directions! 😉
This is a really incredible recipe. Instead of the spices listed, I just add a tablespoon of Mae Ploy yellow curry paste (I found it at a local Oriental food store). The daal is incredibly delicious with this curry paste! My husband and I both love it. We also really like it with fresh rosemary instead of basil. Thanks so much for the recipe!
I made this soup with the curry vegetables last night for a couple of friends and we all loved both dishes so much. We started a no-salt/no-sugar diet 3 weeks ago and both dishes were so flavorful you couldn't even tell they had no salt. I am so happy I happened upon your blog. I read somewhere that you have a cookbook. Where can I buy it?
Hi Talia, yay! Welcome to the blog! 🙂 I am working on a cookbook. Put your name on my mailing list (upper left corner of my website) and I'll announce it when it comes out.