Mujadara: Lebanese Lentils, Rice, and Caramelized Onions

Lebanese Lentils, Rice, and Caramelized Onions=Mujadara…because you can never have too many go-to lentil and rice recipes! This main dish is simple, yet packs a punch on flavor. The warm notes of cinnamon and cumin, along with the caramelized onions give the dish just what it needs to push it to over the edge of unique deliciousness!

What exactly is Mujadara?

Mujadara is a simple Lebanese dish made up of a lentil and rice pilaf. It is topped with sweet caramelized onions and is often served with yogurt.

For this recipe, I topped the lentils and rice with vegan sour cream, next was the caramelized onions, then came a garnish of cilantro and toasted pine nuts, and finally, a dash of lemon juice. The sour cream, pine nuts, cilantro, and lemon juice are totally optional, but in my opinion, they give these Lebanese lentils some extra tasty oomph! I mean, come on….extra oomph is always good right?!

I only used 2 main spices for this Lebanese lentils: cinnamon and cumin–they make such a lovely combination. My tastes buds really favor these two spices together.  I feel like I always add the both of them to my lentils even when I’m just “throwing things together” in a pot in hopes of a delicious outcome.

Now, let’s talk about these caramelized onions! It would be absolutely illegal if caramelized onions were not featured in this dish.  They are soooo so so necessary.  The key thing caramelized onions is that it’s a slow process to get them to the level of sweetness necessary for this dish.  It took about 20-25 minutes to caramelize and slightly crisp my onions.  I look at the pictures of the dish now and realize that I could have left them in the pan about 10 minutes longer to get even more yummy but my tummy ran out of patience, hehe.

Gosh, I don’t think I’ll ever stop experimenting with different flavor combinations of lentils and rice.  The thing that I love about lentils is that you can cook them in bulk.  Make a few different meals out of them just by changing the spices up a little.  I’ll never grow tired of lentils.  Can’t you tell?!

After you try this recipe, check out some of my other lentil dishes:

Authentic Misir Wot| Ethiopian Red Lentil Stew

Moroccan-Spiced Lentils and Greens 

Red Lentil Curry and Spiced Eggplant Slices

Mango Dal

Recipe

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Mujadara: Lebanese Lentils, Rice, and Caramelized Onions

Warm notes of cinnamon & cumin, along with caramelized onions give these Lebanese lentils just what they need to fall over the edge of unique deliciousness! Here's to another simple lentil dish to add to your list of yummy favorites!

Course Main Dish

Cuisine Lebanese, Middle-Eastern, Vegan

Cook Time 30 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

• 1 cup green lentils or use brown
• 2 teaspoons olive oil or use other vegetable oil
• ½ teaspoon cumin
• ¼-1/3 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 pinch coriander
• ¼-1/3 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 large thinly sliced red onion
• salt to taste
• ½ cup cooked brown or basmati rice
• 1 tablespoon toasted pine nuts optional
• 1 squeeze lemon juice optional
• vegan sour cream optional
• cilantro for garnish optional

Instructions

• Pour lentils into a medium-sized saucepan. Next cover them by an inch of cold water. Bring lentils to a bowl then turn heat down to simmer. Next fold in cumin, salt, pepper, cinnamon, and coriander. Cook until lentils are tender.
• Meanwhile as lentils are cooking, heat oil in medium sized pan and add thinly sliced onions along with a dash of salt. Stir to coat onions. Caramelization should take about 20-25 minutes (see pictures in post for example).
• Note: Stir often to prevent onions from sticking to pan. If onions begin to stick, add a dash of water. When caramelization/crisping process is complete, remove onions from pan and set aside on a paper towel covered plate.
• When lentils are done cooking, fold in cooked rice. Taste and if needed, adjust salt and other spices until desire flavor is reached.
• Now begin plating your layers. Scoop lentils and rice into a bowl and top with (optional) vegan sour cream. Next comes the caramelized onions. You can stop here or keep the flavor going by adding the toasted pine nuts, cilantro, and a nice squeeze of lemon juice.

If you make this “Lebanese Lentils, Rice, and Caramelized Onions” recipe, let me know how it turns out! 🙂 Rate it, leave a comment below and share a picture on Instagram with the hashtag #veganfitcarter

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