One of my favourite Indian dishes is lemon rice.
This version is based on a recipe from Mamta’s Kitchen, a wonderful Indian cooking resource managed by my friend Kavey and her husband Pete. It was a great opportunity to use my new curry leaves, which have now dried crispy…
Here’s my take on Mamta’s recipe:
- 3 cups cooked rice (cold)
- vegetable oil for frying
- 1 teaspoon brown mustard seeds
- 1 teaspoon dried channa dal
- 12 curry leaves
- 1 onion, chopped
- ¼ cup shredded coconut
- juice of 1 lemon (1 – 2 tablespoons, to taste)
- 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1 dried Kashmiri chilli, chopped
- ½ teaspoon ground turmeric
1. Heat the oil until hot in a large non-stick pan. Add the mustard seeds and fry them until they start to pop. Be careful not to get your face too close to the pan.
2. Add the channa dal and curry leaves, and stir until the channa just starts to brown.
3. Add the onions and fry until soft.
4. Add the salt, turmeric, chilli and coconut and stir well, then scatter in the rice, breaking up any lumps with your fingers as you go. Add the lemon juice and then stir well until the rice is warmed through and uniformly yellow in colour.
I sometimes add a handful of peanuts to this dish, and it’s also quite delicious made with lime instead of lemon juice. It’s a tasty, easy Sunday lunch, and a great way to use up leftover rice!
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
1. This looks wonderful
2. I am going to vist their site
3. how long can you keep curry leaves…I am going to my Indian neighborhood to buy some…
This looks very interesting – I don’t have curry leaves, and when I googled for a sub, I saw a note that said there really are no subs for it – and another that said not to use dried. But you dry your own – Yes? Are they better than the dried you find in the Asian grocery?
So glad Mamta’s Kitchen could help!
x x
The site is a treasure trove, Kavey! Please thank your mum for me! :)
Norma, Doc, thank you both, and on the issue of curry leaves – I’ve never bought them before, nor dried them. Usually they come already combined in a curry powder or spice mix. In the past I’ve frozen fresh ones, but I found they went soggy after some time in the freezer.
This time both the Spice Girl and my mum gave me branches from their trees, and they went paper dry after a week hanging in my kitchen near the oven. They were perfect in this dish – I’m going to try using more next time. Doc, I also read the bit about not using dried leaves, but other sites suggested that if you were using dried, you should use twice the quantity of fresh.
The ones I’ve seen for sale in Asian grocery stores haven’t been nearly as green as my dried ones are. I wish I could give you both a branch, my mum’s tree is huge! :)
I love Indian food. The spices, the aromas, it can be so budget friendly and it tastes so darn tooting good. Ive got all the ingredients for that, including a dhal from last night which needs a little friendly something by its side. Thanks Celia :-)
Brydie, it is often so economical, isn’t it? And as you say, so darn good! :)
Sounds delicious and certainly a recipe I want to try!
Thanks for stopping by! :) I hope you enjoy this – it’s one of my favourite dishes! :)
Ah, lovely! As the owner of a lemon tree whose boughs are about to break from the weight of the fruit, I am grateful for any recipe with the word “lemon” in it!
Amanda, I can’t wait until out lemon tree gets established! Have you been making preserved lemons? And here’s our recipe for really easy microwave lemon curd…
https://figjamandlimecordial.com/2009/03/17/lemon-curd/
I’m lucky to be able to buy fresh curry leaves easily – they do impart a very distinctive flavour. Very nice recipe.
Thanks Sally! Fresh curry leaves are fabulous – I’d plant a tree in my backyard, but we don’t have any more room! :)
This sounds very good. Last night was Indian fare at our house – my first time cooking Indian food. I made (all from scratch) roti, fish cakes with spicy apple & fig chutney, spicy okra & tomatoes, and black bean salad with shredded coconut (even cracked open the coconut myself). It was a lot of work, but it was soooo good. I’ll have to try this recipe out the next time I’m cooking Indian food again. :)
Cat, I hope you took some photos for your blog – all those dishes sound amazing! :)
We were too hungry to wait! It took a lot longer than I had anticipated and dinner wasn’t on the table until almost 9pm. :) I’ll have the camera ready next time tho. ;)
Celia what fabulously fragrant rice – lovely! We have (no had) as we are flying home today a curry tree in our garden here.
:-) Mandy
Mandy, can’t wait to read about your homecoming! :)
Yummy. How great are curry leaves? Love all the herbs and spices and tasty treats you use. It’s so inspiring to keep venturing into the cuisines I don’t know. So thank you lovely. :) Hope your enjoying your week so far.
Anna, so far so good, hope it’s been pleasant and not too cold in the ACT! I don’t think I cook nearly enough Indian food – something I need to work on this year, I’ve decided…
It is so good to add some flavour to rice :)
Tandy, I love flavoured rice in all forms – Indian rice, fried rice, paella, risotto – actually, almost all forms. I’ve never been a fan of rice pudding! :)
My idea of a great lunch too! I usually freeze my curry leaves, they don’t stay crispy but they still taste good. I also buy fresh tumeric and freeze that too. You’re so lucky to have access to fresh ones!
Becca, I haven’t had much luck freezing curry leaves, but I know lots of people do it. I tend to forget they’re in the freezer, and then find a mushy bag of broken green bits a year later. I haven’t used a lot of fresh turmeric, but apparently it’s massively better than the dried…
Looks delicious – and it would be good to eat with fish or chicken?
Anna, thank you, I eat it with whatever I can find, but often just on its own…
Gosh this sounds good, Celia. I think I could be persuaded to do anything with a good dose of Indian food in my belly. Thanks for sharing your recipe!
Chris, thanks, the Mamta’s site has a squillion Indian recipes to try. I don’t think I’ll be buying any more Indian cookbooks any time soon! :)
YUM! this looks great.
Curry leaves makes me remember when I lived in the north coast of NSW and had a journey of about an hour on the bus to high school. For some reason on one of the windy roads there were a whole lot of curry plants growing wild – about a kilometre stretch all together.
And it always seemed to be on this stretch of road where the bus would quite regularly break down! In its defence, it was at the top of a hilly section, so we would all get off the bus and walk down the hill, picking curry leaves. The smell always reminds me of that time!
Anne, they do smell amazing, both the leaves and the stems! Funny that the bus would always break down in the same spot! :)
Oooooh, this looks very good! I think I can gather together most of the ingredients. It will just take time to find some of them. We love rice and I am always on the lookout for recommended Indian recipes that I can try. I like the warming spices of Indian cooking and the smells (in small doses). We used to have an Indian neighbor and for that time we were spoiled with homemade naan all the time. It was wonderful! Thank you for your take on the recipe!!
Melanie, apparently they also make a version of this rice with tamarind instead of lemon juice, but I’m yet to try that recipe! There is something really magic about the smell of roasting spices! :)
Yum Celia! I love having something other than plain rice. I always mean to make it exciting but forget. I have some curry leaves in the pantry that I got on my last trip to the Asian grocer so I’ll have to give this a go.
Claire, hope you like this – it’s one of my favourites!
I’ll be making this for sure!
Thanks Cindy! I’m sure you’ll have no trouble sourcing curry leaves! :)
What a lovely alternative to fried rice! And I have some curry leaves that need using up too! :)
Lorraine, it’s really nice with lime juice as well. And peanuts – I just didn’t have any on hand…
This sounds delicious and so simple! Sigh. I’d love to have access to a curry tree. I’m cooking India in a couple of days and am totally overwhelmed by all the great possibilities… I’m thinking saag paneer as two of the options (the spinach and then the cheese), but who knows :)
Sasha, sounds like great fun! Love saag paneer…
I love Lemon rice. We made it sometimes with some leftover rice… Yours looks so fresh and light…. I’ve never added coconut in mine, but now this need to change…I think coconut is a wonderful addition :)
Tes, I’ve never added coconut either, but it really gave the dish a distinct flavour. I used thick shredded coconut rather than dessicated, but if you have access to fresh, that would be amazing…
Looks like a great way to use up leftover rice, although when we have leftover we normally give it to our dog..
Hehehe…our chickens usually get leftover rice I haven’t found another use for – they absolutely adore it!