Lentil and Chickpea Curry with Spinach

This Lentil and Chickpea Curry with Spinach is healthy, budget-friendly, tasty, and can be made from storecupboard and fairtrade ingredients. There's no need to pre-soak the lentils and it's ready in just 40 minutes. It's also, vegan, dairy, and gluten-free!

Chickpeas and lentils are traditional curry ingredients and are full of protein. The creamy sauce is made with coconut milk and tomatoes. I love adding fresh spinach to my curries. It not only adds great colour but is nutritious and needs no additional cooking. Finally stirring through lemon juice at the end lifts the flavours. You might also like my Aubergine and Chickpea curry recipe. If you're after more easy recipes with lentils, try my Roasted Red Pepper and Lentil Soup or Mushroom and Lentil Ragu.

Jump to:

• Ingredients
• Instructions
• Substitutions
• How to soak chickpeas
• How to Serve
• Sustainability
• Storage
• Top tip
• 📖 Recipe

Ingredients

This easy chickpea and lentil curry or dahl makes a great standby recipe as it can be made from storecupboard ingredients.

• Red Lentils. Red lentils need a shorter cooking time than green or brown lentils, so are perfect for a quick curry. I use dried red lentils, but if you want to speed up the cooking time, even more, you could use tinned or canned lentils that have already been cooked and soaked.
• Chickpeas. Use tinned or canned chickpeas that have already been soaked. Drain the chickpeas and rinse under cold water before adding or your sauce will be gloopy.
• Curry Paste. A Korma curry paste is perfect for this recipe.

See recipe card for quantities.

Instructions

Heat the oil in a large pan and fry the onion and garlic for 2 minutes over a medium heat.

Stir in the curry paste or curry powder and fry for 1 minute. Keep stirring.

Drain and rinse the chickpeas, then add with the lentils, coconut milk, and chopped tomatoes. Bring to a boil then simmer for 30 minutes until the lentils are soft, stirring occasionally. Add a little water if necessary.

Stir the spinach and lemon juice through the curry and serve.

Substitutions

• Lentils- red lentils work best as they have the shortest cooking time. However, you could use green or brown lentils and let the curry simmer for longer. Dried lentils will take on the flavour of the curry when cooked.
• Chickpeas - presoaked chickpeas are the easiest to use in this recipe. However, if you have dried chickpeas, you can use these. Dried chickpeas need to be soaked before adding them to a recipe. (see below). Dried chickpeas triple in size when cooked, so for this recipe, you will need about 90g of dried chickpeas.
• Lemons - I would always use fresh lemons where possible, but as this recipe can be cooked from store cupboard ingredients, you can substitute bottled lemon juice if you need to.
• Coconut Milk - you can use full fat or light coconut milk. Full fat is thicker but the lentils make the sauce thick anyway so I always use the lighter version in this recipe.
• Curry Paste - I use a curry paste as it's easier than curry powder. However, you can use curry powder instead. As a general rule, use 1 teaspoon of curry powder for every tablespoon of curry paste in the recipe. All curry powders are different strengths so you might want to start with a smaller amount and add more if you need.

How to soak chickpeas

Ideally, dried chickpeas need to be soaked overnight or for about 12 hours. Add the chickpeas to a large bowl and cover with cold water.

For a quicker method, place the chickpeas in a large pan and cover with 2 inches of cold water. Bring to a boil and boil for one minute. Remove from the heat, cover with a pan lid and let them soak for at least one hour.

How to Serve

I like to serve this lentil curry with rice or naan bread or both. The most common rice to serve with curry is basmati rice. Basmati is a long grain rice and the grains stay separated after cooking making it nice and fluffy. You could also use more fragrant rice such as Jasmine rice. For a homemade 'Naan' bread, you might like to try my simple Flatbread recipe. Made with just 3 ingredients, this is a very simple bread you can make at home and it only takes 10 minutes.

Sustainability

A Lentil and Chickpea curry is a particularly great Fairtrade curry recipe as over half the ingredients can be bought Fairtrade. You can now buy Fairtrade olive oil, chickpeas, red lentils, rice, coconut milk, curry powder, and even lemons. Fairtrade is a direct way to help and support some of the world's poorest farmers. Climate Justice is a big part of what Fairtrade stands for. Millions of farmers across the world who produce our food and clothes are on the frontline of the climate emergency. Check out my most popular Fairtrade recipes for more ideas.

Storage

This vegan chickpea curry can be stored in the fridge for 2-3 days. It can also be frozen and is best used within 3 months. You can re-heat it in the microwave until it is piping hot. This is the most energy-efficient way to reheat it. Otherwise, reheat in a pan, stirring occasionally so it doesn't stick to the bottom. Like all good curries, this tastes even better the next day once the flavours have had a chance to infuse.

Top tip

The most energy efficient way to cook rice! Bring the rice to a boil in a pan with a lid. Once it is boiling, turn the heat off and leave the rice covered for 30 minutes. The rice will steam and cook without needing any more heat.

📖 Recipe