Cabbage paruppu usli / Cabbage stir fry with lentils (Instant pot recipe)

Here’s another instant pot recipe for a tam-bram classic dish “Paruppu usli”. Paruppu meaning lentils is steamed and sauteed until nice and crispy which is then added to vegetables like beans, bell peppers, kothavarangai or cabbage. This is one of my favorite dishes and I love to eat this with plain rice or as a side with vathal kuzhambu rice. My mom usually skips the steaming part and sautes the lentils directly which give a super crispy usli.. I have steamed them a little to reduce the sauteeing time. So here goes the recipe –

Ingredients :

• 4 cups cabbage chopped
• 1/2 cup toor dal soaked
• 1/2 cup chana dal soaked
• 1 sprig curry leaves
• 2 to 4 dried red chillies depending on your spice levels
• 1/2 tsp mustard seeds
• 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tsp urad dal
• 1/4 tsp asafoetida
• salt to taste
• 1 tbsp + 1tbsp sesame oil (more for a crispier usli)

Method:

Soak the toor dal, chana dal, red chillies, curry leaves in little water for 20 to 30 minutes.

After 20 to 30 minutes, grind the soaked ingredients along with half of the asafoetida and little salt to a coarse paste. Set it aside. (Do not add to much water while grinding. It has to be thick paste. Add just enough water needed for grinding.)

Now switch on the saute mode, add 1 tbsp oil and let it heat up. Add the mustard seeds, cumin seeds, remaining asafoetida, urad dal and let the mustard seeds splutter.

Now switch off the saute mode. Add 1 to 2 tbsp water, the chopped cabbage and little salt.

Now keep a plate on top of the cabbage ( You can keep the plate on top of the trivet too) Spread the ground dal mixture on the plate. Do not add any water inside. The ground mixture should be a thick paste.)

Now close the lid and cook on high pressure for 0 minutes. When done, Quick pressure release.

Now take out the plate containing the lentils alone. When it is a little warm to handle, crumble the lentil mixture and add it to an iron skillet or non stick pan and saute it with 1 tbsp oil until they become nice and crispy.

When done, add this crispy lentils to the cooked cabbage and mix everything well. Serve hot with rice and sesame oil or as a side with vathal kuzhambu rice or rasam sadham.

Note:

If the cabbage has little water left after pressure cooking it, saute it for a minute or so until the water dries up.

Can substitute cabbage with beans, cluster beans or capsicum. This recipe will work well with beans and cluster beans. But the capsicum might get mushy. So it is not advisable to do capsicum usli in this method.