Easy Lentil Mulligatawny Soup Recipe to Try

Each country has soups that use the ingredients typically associated with the country’s cuisine. One of the best-known and most popular soups from Indian cuisines is mulligatawny. It is traditionally made with vegetables and spices, although meat variations exist. People first made mulligatawny soup in India during the time of the British Raj, and it was the British who first made the dish using Indian ingredients. It then became a peasant food due to the low cost, wide availability, and deliciousness of the ingredients in the soup. An alternative to vegetable mulligatawny is lentil mulligatawny, which is similar to lentil dahl.

Although lentil mulligatawny shares some of the same ingredients as vegetable mulligatawny, including vegetables and spices, the primary ingredient is lentils. It also differs as the lentil version of the soup usually omits rice. There are multiple variations of a mulligatawny soup with lentils. Recipes for the popular Indian soup are passed through the generations, and people often adapt them to suit their tastes, using different spices to alter the heat levels and flavours.
Our recipe for lentil mulligatawny uses cheap yet tasty ingredients to create a delicious soup that is easy to make and simple to adapt to your preferences. Here is our easy lentil mulligatawny soup recipe.

Useful Information

Ingredients for Lentil Mulligatawny Soup Recipe

• 7 oz./ 200g red split lentils
• 750ml vegetable stock
• 1 white onion finely diced
• 1 large carrot peeled and finely diced
• 3 garlic cloves minced
• 2 red chillies finely diced
• 2 tsp minced fresh ginger
• 1 can of chopped tomatoes
• 1 tbsp curry powder
• ½ tsp cinnamon powder
• 1 tsp crushed coriander seeds
• Seeds from 6 cardamom pods crushed
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 can of coconut milk
• Salt and black pepper to taste

How to Make Lentil Mulligatawny

1. Grind your spices, chop the vegetables and chillies, and mince the garlic and ginger.
2. Add the oil to a large pan and put over medium-high heat on the hob, then add the onions and carrots.
3. Cook for five minutes or until the onions have softened and turned golden.
4. Add the garlic, ginger, and chillies to the pan and cook for another five minutes.
5. Next, add all the spices to the pan and stir through, so the other ingredients are coated and the spices begin to cook.
6. Add the canned tomatoes, lentils, and stock to the pan, and bring to a boil.
7. When the mixture reaches a boil, turn down the heat and let it simmer for 30 minutes.
8. Use a hand blender to partially blend the ingredients, leaving some chunks of vegetables for texture. Alternatively, remove two-thirds of the soup and blend in a blender before returning to the pan and stirring through the chunks.
9. Stir in the coconut milk and warm through.
10. Season the lentil mulligatawny soup with salt and black pepper to taste.
11. Serve the mulligatawny soup in bowls, or leave it to cool and store it in the refrigerator or freezer until later.

Additional Tips

• If you are a meat lover, you can add some shredded, leftover meat to your lentil mulligatawny. Try making chicken mulligatawny or lamb mulligatawny. You might also want to replace the vegetable stock with meat stock.
• Another soup you may like to try is rasam, a traditional South Indian soup.
• Try adding some diced apple for a different flavour.
• A quicker way to make lentil mulligatawny is to use canned lentils that you drain and rinse before adding to the soup.