Punjabi Chole

Ingredients
• 3 Cups Kabooli Chana soaked overnight
• ½ t soda-bi-carb
•
• 1” piece of ginger, peeled and grated
• 2 Cups chopped onion
• 1 Cups chopped tomatoes
• 2-3 Tb spoon oil
• 2 t red chilli powder
• 1 t garam masala (optional)
• salt
for the masala
• 2 T (heaped) coriander seeds
• 1 T anardana ,omit if not available
• 1” piece dalchini or cassia bark
• 4-5 cloves
• 1 t black peppercorns
• 3-4 badi elaichi (black cardamom)
• 2 t cumin seeds
• 1 tejpatta
• 1 or 2 whole dry red chillies (optional)
Garnish
• green chillies, slit down the middle
• tomatoes, cut into thick wedges
• lime, sectioned

Preparation
1. Drain the chhole; some of what makes these beans hard to digest is water soluble and you will get rid of some of that this way. Rinse them out once more to make sure.
2. Put them in a pressure cooker with enough water to cover them (by about an inch). If you like your chhole a bit on the softer side, add half a teaspoon of baking soda (more will make them mush) to the chhole. No salt at this point.
3. Cook under pressure for 20 minutes, or cook covered in a heavy pan till tender.
4. While the chickpeas are cooking, heat a pan to roast your whole spices. On medium heat roast the spices, all together, shaking and tossing, till they have almost blackened. Cool and grind to a powder.
5. Heat oil in a heavy pan (or karahi). Add ginger and stir till just fragrant. Add chopped onions and cook till pink, when they are just getting tinged at the edges.
6. Now add the tomatoes and fry (bhuno), stirring all the time, till the oil separates. There isn’t much oil to separate here, so it has to be done on medium heat and takes a long time (20-30 minutes).
7. If there is some parallel kitchen activity going on, then this works very well. When cooking a larger quantity (or when short on time), I would suggest you increase the amount oil (one and half times or double) since you don’t want to be in the kitchen for the good part of a day.
8. Once the ginger-onion-tomato is fried well and almost dry, add the fresh ground spice blend, garam masala (optional), and red chilli powder.
9. Add the slit green chillies and stir for a few minutes .
10. Remove the green chillies and add this fragrant paste to the cooked chhole, and salt.
11. Adjust water to your liking. Mix and cook (simmer) for 20 minutes, stirring every now and then, or cook in the pressure cooker for 10 minutes.