Vegan Chana Masala Recipe | Chickpea Curry Recipe

How to Make Chana Masala?

Chana Masala, is a tangy, juicy, and yummy dish! With a perfect blend of spices, hot and sweet, chana masala is a crowd favourite side dish that goes with all kinds of rotis.

This chickpea curry recipe is a super yum one that shows you how to make the same yummy dish without oil, ghee, butter or red chili. Oil is a processed food and ghee and butter are animal foods, the consumption of which has been linked to chronic lifestyle diseases such as diabetes, hypertension and heart disease. Red chili powder irritates the digestive tract, so we recommend that you reduce consuming the same. Some alternatives to red chili powder are pepper, slit fresh chili, broken red chili.

Whole Food Plant Based Chana Masala Recipe

Course: Course 2: Vegetables Dishes & Side Dish for Course 3: Grain Dishes for Lunch & Dinner Meals
Cuisine: Punjabi Recipe from North India
Prep Time: 10 mins
Servings: 4 people
Cook Time: 30 mins

INGREDIENTS

For Boiling

1 cup Chana dried and soaked, or black chickpeas can be used
1 Bay Leaf
1 stick Cinnamon
4 Cloves
2 pods Cardamom / Elaichi
2 Green Chili slit
1 cup Water as required

Chana Masala gravy

2 Tomato chopped
1/2 inch Fresh Ginger chopped
1/4 tsp Turmeric Powder
1/4 tsp Garam Masala
3/4 tsp Dry Mango Powder / Amchur Powder
4 Black Peppercorns
1/4 tsp Carom Seeds / Ajwain
1 tsp Cumin / Jeera
3/4 tsp Coriander Seeds / Dhaniya
1 tsp Fennel seeds sompu, saunf
1 tsp Amla Powder
4 tsp Miso Paste (Healthy Salt Alternative. See Nutrition Science Highlights below)

Garnishing

4 tsp Coriander leaves chopped
Juice of 1/2 Lemon
2 tsp Groundnuts mildly roasted and powdered

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Boil chickpeas with other ingredients in the 'For Boiling' section above with closed lid.
2. While it cooks, prepare the gravy masala by dry roasting cumin, coriander, carom, fennel seeds and peppercorns. Blend all this into powder and then add other Chana Masala Gravy ingredients and blend again to get a smooth paste.
3. Add this mixture to the boiling mixture and cook it well.
4. If you want a thicker gravy, blend some of the cooked chickpeas and add it back.
5. Once everything is cooked well, garnish with ginger, coriander leaves, and powdered, roasted groundnuts. Squeeze some lemon juice for tanginess.
6. Serve fresh with rotis, rice or millets.

Plant Based Chef Pro Tips for Best Chana Masala

1. To make it richer, blended coconut can be added as well, after the chickpea curry is cooked.
2. Onion and garlic can be blended with the masala and boiled, but this takes away the sattvic nature of the dish.
3. If you don't want too much tanginess or sourness, reduce the amount of tomato or dry mango powder.

Nutrition Science Highlights for WFPB Chana Masala Recipe

1. Why Miso Paste? Miso paste is fermented & salted soya bean paste. American Heart Association Maximum recommended maximum daily salt intake of 3.75 grams per person to minimise risk of high blood pressure, stomach cancer and chronic kidney disease. In addition to helping us restrict salt intake, replacing salt with miso paste also helps by neutralising the negative effects of salt by soya phytonutrients. You can easily make fresh miso paste at home by mixing 100 grams of cooked soya paste with 10 grams of salt, or 10 tablespoons of cooked soya paste with 1 tablespoon of salt. If making at home, ensure to use immediately, or freeze in batches to use later. Or, simply use 3.75 grams of salt or less per day per person and add 18 to 20 grams (dry weight) of soya beans in any dishes, spread through the day!
2. Why not dairy? Dairy products have been found to be associated with increased risk of chronic diseases, such as diabetes mellitus, hypertension, obesity, asthma, PCOS, and heart disease. We can still enjoy our milk, cream, and butter though - as long as they are made from whole plant foods!
3. Why not tadka? Tadka, thaaLippu, oggaraNe. Tempering spices in oil is quintessential to Indian cuisine. This practice may have started as a compromise when whole nuts were unavailable, and indeed, is more common in inland, drier areas where nuts do not grow easily, all year round. You can enjoy the taste and fragrance, though, by just dry roasting the spices you require, without the oil, or even better, mixing spice powders directly into your dish!
4. Why nuts instead of oil? Whole foods are healthier than processed foods. When nuts are pressed and oil is extracted, fiber and phytonutrients are lost, along with many other nutrients. Therefore, whole nuts are much healthier than oils, whether cold-pressed or refined.