The redemption of lentils

A few days ago I was sharing with a friend of mine how Tim and I are economical eaters and she began to rave about her recipe for lentils. “Lentils, yuck,” I thought, “Lentils are bland and boring.” True, I may be prejudice. You see ever since my sophomore year of high school, when I went on a two month “lentil diet,” I have refrained from preparing lentils in anything besides soup.

But today I felt adventuresome and decided to give my friend’s recipe a try...

Wow! I really don’t think I have ever had anything as delicious in my life. I had made an extra-serving for Tim to eat for dinner one of the evenings I had to work, but there were definitely no leftovers since we both elected to have seconds. We seriously liked it so much that we spent the meal plotting who all we could have over to feed these lentils to. That’s when I decided that this recipe definitely merited mention in the blog.

Mujaddara is an easy-on-the-pocket, simple-to-prepare, Middle-Eastern dish that is packed with essential yummy-ness. Today for lunch I made a spin off the traditional recipe:

• First I carmalized 1.5 onions using olive oil
• Then I heated 1 cup cooked lentils + 1.5 cups boiled rice in the skillet until rice/lentils were crisp.
• I seasoned the lentils and rice with salt & pepper and plated with the carmalized onions on top
• Tim drizzled his with olive oil, and I added extra pepper to mine [whatever floats your boat.]

Since I already had cooked rice and lentils the entire prep time only took about 25 minutes. When I did the math the cost pre-serving is less than a dollar, and given further researched I discovered the health benefits of this dish add up too:

Calories- 339, Protein- 13, Fiber-13 [for meal-sized portion]

With all these elements in its favor you should definitely give Mujaddara a shot. If you are unwilling to risk preparing it personally, come over to my basement and I’ll gladly treat! I am convinced that once you taste this meal you too will feel compelled to join my crusade to redeem this oft-overlooked legume. The world must know how great lentils can taste!

Devotional Addendum:

I feel the need to tie this post in with my theme of discovering the truth of scripture in the real world, but also know that it would be a stretch to write an entire devotional around the fact that while I consumed this scrumptious repast the psalmist’s admonition, “Taste and see that the Lord” is good came to mind. After all I have always assumed that the psalmist is talking about tasting the Presence of God, not a bowl of lentils.

On the other hand since this Middle Eastern dish is a part of Jewish cuisine, it seems reasonable that many of the heroes of the Bible would have eaten similar flavor combinations. Perhaps it was the purity of a simple dish like this that for the Psalmist connected the sense of taste with the goodness of the God who has given man both the ability to taste and food to enjoy.

Another possible Biblical tie I personally I like to imagine is the apostle Paul enjoying Mujaddara with the members of a house church he planted… with all the places Paul traveled I sure that if someone was making Mujaddara at that point, he got to try it.

These musings maybe a crazy, non-sequetor way of thinking… forgive me. Sometimes my imagination runs away with itself.

Here’s the concrete take- away-point in this random addendum: The next time you get a chance to eat something delicious [be it Mujaddara or anything else] pause for a moment to consider how God has gone beyond providing for the needs of the body and has made the act of eating a source of enjoyment for the human soul. How can we keep from praising the greatness of our Lord? God’s goodness is evident, even in a bowl of lentils.