Vegan: Venn Pongal

Status: Vegan
Mood: Comfort Indian food
Labor: Minimal to moderate
Prep Time: an hour or two

Ingredients:

• 1 cup brown rice
  
• 1/2 cup yellow split peas
• Frozen spinach
  
• Mustard seeds
  
• Garlic
  
• Curry powder
• Turmeric
  
• Black pepper
  
• Salt
  

Le Process:

1. Add the rice and daal in a pot with six cups of water, and boil until everything is super mushy. This will take about an hour, but for some reason it took me longer? Must be the high Michigan elevation...
   
2. Dry-roast the mustard seeds in a skillet until they start popping, and add them to the rice-daal mixture along with the other spices. (I would have added cumin seeds if I had any left, so I would recommend dry-roasting those with the mustard seeds as well, in addition to any spice your particularly enjoy.)
   
3. I realized I had added too much salt, so to tone it down I added some frozen spinach, which ended up being delicious. You can anything you want, though, or just leave it as-is.
   
4. Let everything cook for another 15 or so minutes to meld the flavors together.

Notes:

I don't give proportions of spices because I couldn't really tell you how much I put in. I just dump things in according to my own tastes, so just do whatcha want. This is how most future recipes posted here will be as well, so I will cease stating it.

This recipe isn't exactly traditional, because I omitted some ingredients I don't particularly care for, like ginger and cashews. I also don't think it's as thick as it's supposed to be, but I was too impatient to wait. So instead this bastardized version will suffice for me.