Nope, no Covid-era adventures (or misadventures today)

Because me being me, I will keep having culinary adventures now and then. And living alone brings pretty playful disasters or even miracles! When you accidentally discover a dish because you were too lazy or too embroiled in office-work to cook a curry based dish that you anyway would avoid! 🤣

Back in the spring of 2026, I was following a diet and my nutritionist had added moong dal cheela with matar gravy. (Mung lentil pancakes with peas curry)

I have tried making curries but I was never successfully to make one. Because it requires patience and time that yours truly does seem to have but do not like spending them on preparing thick soulful gravy items. 

Anyway, it was a hectic Monday and I wanted to meal-plan my breakfast for the next few days, sp o decided to soak moong dal. I have prepared moong dal cheelas before so it was a no-brainer for me. Initially I considered preparing a light curry of peas but when laziness attacks with its arsenal of comfort and procrastination, it is really difficult to not budge in. 

So I budged in! 🥳

While grinding the moong dal, I randomly decided to add the peas in the grinder. The purée came out beautifully, in a brilliant green colour. To this mixture, I added the usual cheela ingredients- chopped green chillies and ginger, salt and turmeric. 

The mixture spread elegantly on the hot pan and looked so enticing because I have a white non-stick pan, so that the colours can dazzle while we shoot our recipes. The finished cheela also dazzled in green and I paired it with mustard sauce because I did not have the patience to prepare a chutney.

I sent the pictures of this cheela to my mom and sister and asked them to guess the ingredients. They said that these are simple cheelas prepared out of moong lentils with husks. I told them that their guess is wrong in the anticipation that they will be eager to guess the ingredients. 

They were not eager and they stopped responding after their one failed guess. 😝

When I told them that I added peas, then they definitely got amazed but got back to ranting about Delhi, the cold, why every year it is getting colder and why global warming does not work in winters when you are living on the top floor. 😜