I love cooking, I love it more now than I ever thought I would. Yes there are nights I don’t want to cook dinner, but once I start the process my mood usually improves. I had never had Ethiopian food before we decided to adopt from Ethiopia. I quickly found out I love it. It is now tied with Mexican as my favorite food. I had put off learning to cook Ethiopian food for far too long. I had built it up in my head as an impossible task, yes injera is not so simple and I need work in that area, but other than that it is like cooking any other food, just different spices.
I am so glad I finally started trying to cook the food. The other night I made two dishes one was bland and I probably won’t ever make it again, just wasn’t really my taste, and the other was SUPER spicy. Like so spicy I was sweating from every pore in my body, but it was also very, very YUMMY. Matt went back for seconds even though he is not a SUPER spicy food eater. The next night I made another half recipe without the berbere so I could combine what was left from the first night with it. The result was the perfect amount of spice for us.
Yemisir Kik We’t
Ingredients:
2 cups split lentils (there are 4 cups in the picture, I was making two different recipes with lentils)
6 cups water (boiled)
2 cups red onions (chopped)
1.5 cups oil (I later learned this was a spiced oil that I should have made ahead of time, I just used olive)
1 Tbsp. ginger
1 tsp. garlic (I just used a clove)
1 cup berbere (I thought I was smart and only used 3/4, haha still too spicy)
1/4 tsp. cumin
The ingredients for both of my dishes
Preparation
Wash lentils and boil for 5 minutes (until the lentils are tender). Cook onions adding oil and stirring gently until golden brown adding a little water as needed (I didn’t see a need with all that oil!) to prevent sticking. Remove lentils from heat, drain and reserve water for later use. Add the lentils to the onions. Add reserved water stirring to prevent mixture from sticking to the bottom of the pan. (the second night I was lazy and skipped draining the lentils and just added it all at once) Add everything else. Simmer for 20 minutes. 6 or more servings.
Helpers being silly
Uh-oh the helpers are done!
Noah on the second night decided he was just join in on the fine, he was so mad when I wouldn’t let him stick his spoon in my pot.