Greeklentils Recipes

Steps:

• Wash and sort lentils. Put them and 2 qts. water over medium heat.
• When they begin to simmer, add everything else.
• Continue to simmer, uncovered, until they are cooked and sauce is thickened, about 30 minutes.

Steps:

• Place lentils in a large saucepan; add enough water to cover by 1 inch. Bring water to a boil and cook for 10 minutes; drain.
• Heat olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add garlic, onion, and carrot; cook and stir until the onion has softened and turned translucent, about 5 minutes. Pour in lentils, 1 quart water, oregano, rosemary, and bay leaves. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for 10 minutes.
• Stir in tomato paste and season with salt and pepper. Cover and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the lentils have softened, 30 to 40 minutes. Add additional water if the soup becomes too thick. Drizzle with 1 teaspoon olive oil and red wine vinegar to taste.

Steps:

• In a large stock pot, heat the oil and saute garlic, celery, onions, and carrot until veggies are tender.
• Add the water, stock, and the rinsed lentils.
• Bring mixture to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer, cover and cook for 45 minutes or until lentils are tender, stirring occasionally.
• Add the tomatoes, along with the juice in the can, as well as the chopped herbs, and salt and pepper.
• Stir in the spinach and simmer uncovered for 15-20 minutes more.
• Re-check seasoning before serving.

Steps:

• Prepare the lentils: Lentils are harvested by machine so often they come with small rocks and irregular looking beans that you do not want in your soup. To check the lentils, pour them in small batches onto a plate so they are able to spread out. Give them a quick look over, remove any foreign objects, and dump them into a bowl. Repeat until you have checked all of your lentils. Then fill the bowl with cold water and rinse your lentils 2-3 time to remove any dust or bean skins. Throw the lentils into a big soup pot.
• Dice your carrots and celery and throw them into the pot as well.
• Add 2 boxes of stock to the pot and put the soup on a high heat until it boils and then reduce to medium. Cook for 30-40 minutes or until the lentils are done.
• To finish the soup, turn the heat to low. Now add the oregano and salt and pepper to taste. The soup is finished with a liberal addition of red wine vinegar, which adds an important top note to the soup. We often add it to the soup and then have the vinegar on the table to allow folks to add additional vinegar to their liking.
• Optional Ingredients: Over the years I have tried out other Faki recipes. Here are my favorite additions from those experiments. The bulgur bulks up the soup into more of a stew. Despite how successful the soup can be if you add some (or all) of thee additions, I still most often stick with the basic soup. To add the additions, the tomatoes, spinach, garlic, and/or bulgur wheat goes in at the same time as the stock. The additional spices go in during the seasoning phase.

Steps:

• Place the water, broth, lentils, carrots, onion, celery and 1/2 teaspoon oregano in a 5- or 6-qt. slow cooker. Cook, covered, on low 4-5 hours or until lentils are tender., Stir in the spinach, tomato sauce, olives, vinegar, garlic, salt, pepper and remaining 1/2 teaspoon oregano. Cook, covered, on low about 1 hour longer, until spinach is wilted. If desired, serve with red onion, parsley and lemon wedges.

Steps:

• Place lentils in a pot with water to cover; bring to a boil. Drain, reserving water.
• Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Saute onion until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add garlic; cook for 1 minute. Add celery and carrots; cook and stir until slightly tender, about 5 minutes. Add the partially cooked lentils, potatoes, tomatoes, parsley, vinegar, cinnamon, salt, and pepper; cover with water and bring soup to a boil.
• Reduce heat to low; partially cover and let simmer until liquid is almost gone, 35 to 45 minutes.

Steps:

• Clean the lentils with fresh cold water to avoid foaming when cooking.
• Mix 2 cups of lentils with the 8 cups of water and 1 tablespoon of salt.
• Heat on high, uncovered for approximately 30 minutes, mixing slightly every 10 minutes, removing any foam that may have come up.
• After the lentils turn tender and soft (not melted), make sure there is only about 2 cups of water remaining (add or remove water).
• Add the half cup of rice. Cook for 10 mins at medium fire.
• Simultaneously with the rice, fry the chopped cup of onion in the olive oil and vegetable oil until golden brown (should be about 10 minutes).
• After the 10 minutes pass, slowly pour the oil and onion over the lentils and rice. Lower the heat to Low, and let it lay for 10 minutes (do NOT mix).
• After the 10 minutes pass, add the quarter cup of vinegar and mix everything.
• Cover with a thick clean kitchen towel and leave covered for about 10 minutes.
• After the 15 minutes pass, you should have a thick pilaf of lentils and rice, with onions showing up here and there.

Steps:

• In a large pot, cover lentils with boiling water and allow to boil for 10 minutes.
• Drain lentils of this 'first boiling' (greeks think that this process makes the lentils easier to digest - I prefer it).
• Put lentils back into pot.
• Add bulgar or barley (if using), onions, garlic, carrots, tomato paste, bay leaves, salt and pepper.
• Pour 2 ½ quarts of boiling water over lentils, bring to a boil.
• When mixture boils, decrease temperature to leave the lentils cooking at a simmer and cook, covered, for 1 ½ hours.
• Add olive oil and balsamic vinegar and simmer ½ an hour longer.
• Taste.
• If the lentils are still too firm to the bite, allow to cook until they are tender and soup has thickened (soup will continue to thicken as it cools).
• If the soup is too thick, you can thin with a little hot water.
• Traditionally, we eat this soup with lots of Kalamata olives, feta cheese and crusty bread.
• I serve half the soup on one day and freeze the other half (it freezes beautifully) to serve on another day when I'm too busy to cook.
• Crockpot Version: Put all the ingredients except for olive oil and balsamic vinegar into your crockpot.
• Cook on low for 7 hours.
• Add olive oil and balsamic vinegar and cook a further 2 hours.
• Ev's notes: You can enrich this already delicious soup by making a couple of variations. Add 1/2 lb of minced bacon, but cut back the olive oil to a couple of tablespoonfuls; or add 1 lb of sliced sausage, like Kielbasa. Again, cut back on the oil.
• New note: (added Dec. 27, 2004) I have taken to adding 1/2 cup bulgur wheat to this soup when I add all the other ingredients; it makes the soup more nutritionally complete if totally vegetarian, and really good and hearty; I strongly urge you try this version.
• Freezer Note: This makes quite a lot of soup - definitely enough for 2 meals (plus a little extra for the super-hungry) for my family of 5. I have taken to freezing half the batch to provide me with a quick, nutritious dinner further on down the line when time is short and you don't want to resort to ordering inches Just defrost in microwave, reheat well and serve.