Indian Style Lentils with Pork Tenderloin – yummy and spicy lentils packed with a ton of health benefits.
I don’t cook with lentils often, but I do love them, especially lentil soup. I should cook with them more often because lentils have lots of health benefits and are full of proteins.
Benefits of lentils include:
- Cholesterol reduction
- Regulates your blood sugar levels
- Improves your digestion
- They include insoluble fiber which gives you the sensation of being full sooner therefore helping in weight loss
- Cancer prevention
- Cardiovascular disease prevention
Those are some great health benefits, and it should make us want to eat them more often. Anyway I don’t want to sound like I’m preaching, so I’ll stop here.
But I will tell you this. This lentil dish is super yummy, and oh so spicy! You know for a person that always says doesn’t like spicy food (me), I sure do make and eat a lot of spicy food lately. Could it be that I’m changing? Maybe!
This dish is full of flavor from all the wonderful ingredients I added and it has Indian flavors from the garam masala and cumin. So good. I served mine over rice, but I think it can be eaten plain as well and cut down on the carbs at the same time.
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Indian Style Lentils with Pork Tenderloin
Ingredients
- 1 pound pork tenderloin cut in small 1 inch pieces
- 4 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 onion chopped
- 6 cloves garlic minced
- 1 carrot chopped
- 1 jalapeno pepper chopped
- 1 teaspoon garam masala
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 1/2 cup red lentils
- 2 1/2 cup vegetable broth
- parsley for garnish
Instructions
- In a dutch oven, heat 2 tbsp of olive oil. Season pork pieces, with salt, pepper and chili powder. Add seasoned pork and sear the meat until it’s brown. Remove meat from dutch oven and set aside.
- Add remaining 2 tbsp of olive oil to dutch oven and heat. Add garam masala and cumin and stir. Add the onion, garlic, carrot and jalapeno pepper, stir well and cook until browned, about 2 to 3 minutes.
- Add lentils, meat and vegetable broth to dutch oven and stir. Taste and season with more salt and pepper if needed. Cover and cook until lentils are tender, about 30 minutes.
- Garnish with parsley and serve over rice or plain.
Do you have to use red lentils, or will brown work?
Brown will work 🙂
It’s July but we had pork tenderloin and lentils so the search found this recipe. While delish, my S.O. thought this would be a great winter comfort food. I loved how the lentils melted in my mouth and the flavors melded quite well.
We seared the pork in the instant pot and then cooked the rest in it using your directions. We cooked everything together for 7m in the IP and it was great!
Will definitely keep this as a winter dish, too!
The whole family loved it!
Do you think I can use pardina lentils instead of red lentils, adjusting for the time to cook them? Thanks.
30 minutes will be great for pardina lentils!
Does this work in a slow cooker?
Yes, it should!
I found this recipe online looking to use some pork tenderloin I had, in an Indian dish. I like the fact there were lintels and I had all the other ingredients except the garam masala. It was easy to make and it was delicious! My youngest son loved it and when my older son and wife came home, they said the home smelled weird. It was just as good reheated! Keep up the good work, Jo!!
Haha! That’s awesome, keep up the ethnic cooking and they’ll soon love the smell!
This was just what I was looking for…added turmeric to the spices and spinach instead of carrots and it was delicious. I will add a little extra water next time as it’s how I prefer it but what an easy, great dish.
We’re so glad you enjoyed it, Christina!
This was great – easy and tasty. I did make a few modifications. I didn’t use the jalapeño pepper since I have small kids. Added frozen spinach and extra carrots. Definitely making it again!
Am making this now.
I don’t have store-bought Garam Masala, but from my Indian cookbook I got a recipe for it: Cardamom (5), cloves (10), cinnamon (1 stick), black pepper (2 tsp), cumin (2 tsp) and coriander (2 tsb).
I have scaled the recipe down so it fit this dish somewhat. I know the above makes more than 1 tsp, and if you want to, you can try to scale it down further. Keep what you don’t use for another day in a sealed container like you would other spices. Ideally you should grind the whole spices together, but if you are lazy – like me – use it whole. It so, fry the whole spices on medium-high heat until they begin to pop, before adding vegetables.
Jo, this recipe is so great! It is super easy to make and very tasty! I really enjoy cooking your Indian-style dishes. Thanks for sharing your amazing recipes.
Thanks Nick. 🙂