Moong Dal Khichdi is a complete meal in itself. Made with rice and lentils, khichdi is healthy, wholesome and good for you! This recipe is also gluten-free. It can be made vegan by replacing the ghee with oil.
Serve this moong dal khichdi with a dollop of ghee on top and yogurt & pickle on the side!
Sometimes I share on this blog things that I couldn’t have even thought of sharing when I first started the blog. I mean who shares khichdi recipe? Not me! would have been my straight answer few years back.
For those unaware, khichdi is a complete meal made with rice and lentils which are pressure cooked together and in India it’s synonyms with illness. I mean if you are ill, you eat khichdi! Usually the simple khichdi is made using only rice, lentil (usually moong dal since it’s very light on the stomach) salt and turmeric.
It’s served with little ghee on top and with side of yogurt. It’s very easy on your stomach and that’s what mom made us whenever we were down with fever or stomach ache or whatever.
It’s also one of those things which most Indian students learn to cook when they leave the country. Every Indian students carries with them a pressure cooker and is always told by their mom to make khichdi if nothing else. You just add rice and dal and water and pressure cook. Can’t get simpler that that right? Wrong!
It becomes all wrong when you have no idea on how to go about it! I never thought I should share such basic recipes on the blog but once I was telling my younger cousin this recipe where I told her “so you add boiled potatoes to this” and she goes like “but how do we boil potatoes” ! Point, I thought!
I mean for someone who has never cooked obviously boiling potato is also not easy, forget about making khichdi! So I hope this post will help those students or newbies who want to learn how to make simple moong dal khichdi. It’s wholesome, easy and good for you!
How to Make Khichdi
Khichdi is made in different ways in different parts of the country. The place I belong to, it’s made like a porridge. So we add extra water with rice and dal and cook it to a porridge like consistency.
In some parts of the country, it’s made almost like a pulao, so if you want your khichdi like that, add only double the amount of water, I added around 4 times.
Also different lentils can be used in khichdi, the most common one in my home is moong dal. It’s actually the most easily digestible dal and so used in khichdi.
The funny thing is that since khichdi is generally assumed to be bland and boring, people don’t really like it. I know my brothers would never eat it unless and until they were ill!
Luckily me and hubby love it, so I make it whenever we want to eat something light and homemade. Hope you guys like this simple Indian recipe.
Method
Take 1/2 cup rice and 1/2 cup moong dal in a bowl.
Soak it in enough water for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, drain the water and set aside.
Add the rice and dal to a pressure cooker and add around 3.5 to 4 cups water. Add salt, turmeric powder and asafoetida and pressure cook on high heat for 5-6 whistles. The rice and dal will cook and be very soft and mushy, set aside.
To another pan on meidum heat, add ghee and oil. You may use only oil to keep it vegan.
Once the oil & ghee is hot, add cumin seeds and mustard seeds. Wait till cumin seeds start sizzling and mustard seeds pop up.
Add chopped ginger and green chili. Saute for 30 seconds or so or till ginger starts turning light golden brown in color.
Add chopped tomatoes and green peas. Cook for 2 minutes, you don’t want the tomatoes to get too mushy.
Add the cooked rice and dal to the pan.
Mix till well combined, add salt and adjust to taste. 
Garnish with cilantro and serve the moong dal khichdi with some extra ghee on top. Also it’s usually served with some papad, achar (pickle) and yogurt on the side.
Moong Dal Khichdi
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup rice
- 1/2 cup moong dal I used moong dal dhuli
- 1/4 teaspoon turmeric powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/8 teaspoon hing powder also know as asafoetida
Tempering
- 1 teaspoon ghee
- 1 teaspoon oil
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 1/2 teaspoon mustard seeds
- 1 teaspoon finely chopped ginger
- 1 green chili finely chopped
- 1 large tomato chopped
- 1/4 cup green peas
- salt to taste
Instructions
- Take 1/2 cup rice and 1/2 cup moong dal in a bowl.
- Soak it in enough water for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, drain the water and set aside.
- Add the rice and dal to a pressure cooker and add around 3.5 to 4 cups water.
- Add salt, turmeric powder and asafoetida and pressure cook on high heat for 5- whistles.
- The rice and dal will cook and be very soft and mushy, set aside.
- To another pan on meidum heat, add ghee and oil. You may use only oil to keep it vegan.
- Once the oil & ghee is hot, add cumin seeds and mustard seeds. Wait till cumin seeds start sizzling and mustard seeds pop up.
- Add chopped ginger and green chili. Saute for 30 seconds or so or till the ginger starts turning light golden brown in color.
- Add chopped tomatoes and green peas. Cook for 2 minutes, you don't want the tomatoes to get too mushy.
- Add the cooked rice and dal to the pan.
- Mix till well combined, add salt and adjust to taste.
- Garnish with cilantro and serve the moong dal khichdi with some extra ghee on top. Also it's usually served with some papad, achar (pickle) and yogurt on the side.
Notes
- Use only 2 cups of water if you want a more pilaf/pulao like consistency for your khichdi. This recipe is for a porridge like khichdi.
- You may use other veggies in the khichdi like spinach, carrots, onion.
- To make it vegan, simply skip the ghee and use oil only.
- The khichdi tastes best when it's warm. It will become thick once you keep it inside the refrigerator. Simply add more water and little salt and bring it to a desired consistency when heating it up again.
Nutrition
Moong Dal Khichdi
Thank you for this .. it’s a great recipe to cook for me and my daughter when the wife isn’t at home. One thing.. does it matter if we use canned tomatoes and coo it with the peas . A lot of the times we are short of fresh tomatoes (heavily used in our home) and have canned tomatoes in the pantry.
you can definitely use canned tomatoes, no problem!
Very good! I didn’t expect it to be so tasty. I didn’t have any green peas so I added sliced okura and instead of moong dal I used red lentils. I guess it is very versatile dish. Thank you Manali for sharing this recipe. For people like me who are not very familiar with Indian food, simple recipes are the best to start with. Thank you! ♡
glad you enjoyed it, thank you for trying! 🙂
Is 278 kcal per serving or in total?
per serving and this is only an estimate calculated automatically by a recipe plugin. please refer to a nutritionist for accurate information.
I would like to try this recipe, but I do not have a pressure cooker. I do have an instant pot, but I don’t know how to convert 5-whistles to the time in the instant pot. Do you have any advice for how to prepare this using an instant pot instead? Thank you
Hi Ashley, cook on 5 minutes high pressure and let release the pressure manually after 10 minutes.
Can the leftovers be frozen
yes should freeze fine!
I really enjoyed this recipe. Too easy to prepare and too tasty.
Love it
What are the cooking times without a pressure cooker?
soak the dal overnight and then cook in a pan until it is cooked. That will take 20 minutes I believe if you have soaked it overnight.