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Copyright © 2025 Foodies Only
Copyright © 2025 Foodies Only
6 Min
06/11/2025
There’s something truly comforting about a grandmother’s kitchen and the nostalgic smells that are associated with it. Whichever part of the country you might have spent your childhood, the familiar smell of chana dal simmering on the stove is a shared experience. Across India, most grandmothers quietly pass down their treasured recipes, each one a little piece of family history wrapped in flavour. Whether it’s the coconut-rich dal from a Bengali dida or a festive sundal made by a Tamil paati, these dishes carry love, memories, and tradition.
Chana dal doesn’t arrive with ceremony in most Indian kitchens, whether cooked into a soup or added to rotis. It soaks quietly in steel bowls, simmers in hot water, and lands on plates in forms we often take for granted. But hidden in that golden split lentil are recipes that have survived migration, fasting days, seasonal changes, and shifts in taste. Across regions, from Tamil Nadu to Sindh, chana dal has been shaped by grandmothers who didn’t follow cookbooks, just rhythm, instinct, and memory. This isn’t a celebration of the dal itself, but of the quiet ways it has held tradition together. Read on for some hearty chana dal recipes, steeped in nostalgia.
The typical Bengali dal made with chana dal and fried coconut pieces is steeped in childhood nostalgia; the most nostalgic memory, perhaps, is its pairing with luchi (poori) for breakfast or lunch. Bengali grandmothers call it ‘narkel diye cholar dal’, meaning chana dal with coconut, and its aroma is unbeatable. It's tempered with ghee (or mustard oil), cumin seeds, asafoetida (hing), fresh ginger, green chillies, raisins (kishmish), and a little sugar. Garam masala and fried coconut are added in the end for the impeccable flavour of the dal with its slightly sweet taste from the sugar and raisins.
In the arid kitchens of Marwar and Konkan, haveji is more than a dal; it’s survival food turned soulful. Haveji is made with chana dal, simmered in buttermilk or thin curd. It’s nourishing with cooling properties, which makes it perfect for scorching summers. Given its roots, it’s definitely a grandmother-approved dish who cooked lovingly. Passed down without fanfare, haveji is rarely found outside old homes now, remembered mostly by those who still eat with their hands only and cook without measurements. It’s not flashy, but it tells of thrift, instinct, and taste shaped by the local climate.
During Navaratri, Tamil homes prepare a festive sundal, which is made from whole chana (kondakadalai) or chana dal. This simple stir-fry is offered as ‘naivedyam’ (prasad) and passed to guests during the festivities. The dish is tempered with mustard seeds, curry leaves, and coconut, and is more than a snack. Tamil paatis prepare it early in the day with soaked dal, which isn’t mushy but firm. It carries the weight of celebration without feeling too heavy. Even outside Navaratri, sundal often finds its way into lunchboxes, which for many adults holds a twinge of nostalgia.
Puran poli is a traditional Maharashtrian dish where whole wheat flour polis are stuffed with cooked and sweetened chana dal (coconut and jaggery). This is no ordinary sweet; it's the soul of Maharashtrian festivals, where grandmothers begin preparations before dawn. The chana dal is cooked until it dissolves like silk, then ground with jaggery and cardamom into what they call 'puran'. Each poli rolled paper-thin requires the skill passed down through generations, the dough is stretched until it becomes translucent, and holding the sweetened dal like a prayer. Puran poli goes by different names, bobbattu, holige, vedmi, and bakshalu and is popular in states of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Goa, Telangana, Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
In old Bihari kitchens, Ramruch was the kind of dish that was always around; it’s made with coarsely ground chana dal, shaped into slabs or dumplings, then slow-cooked in a tomato-based gravy. It’s often reserved for the day after a wedding or during days of fasting, because it is light and doesn’t need onions, garlic, or extravagant spices. Ask any Bihari elder, and they might remember it as something their nani made on wood fires, scooped straight onto bajre ki roti. It’s rare to find this dish lately, but ask the right grandmother, and she'll still smile at its name.
A slow-cooked blend of split urad (mah) and chana dal, mah chole di dal is a staple in old Punjabi kitchens, especially on fasting days or during langar. There’s no garlic, no cream, just ginger, turmeric, and the patient hand of a grandmother who knew when the dal was ‘done’ by the smell alone. The dish likely traces its roots to rural Punjab, where dairy-rich homes preferred hearty, rustic meals that didn’t need meat. It was cooked in iron pots over wood fires, pairing it with rotis and a dollop of butter.
In Sindhi homes, Dal Pakwan isn’t just a basic breakfast item; it’s years of tradition being served on the table. The chana dal is mildly spiced, topped with chopped onions, tamarind chutney, and coriander, and served with crisp, flaky pakwan (puris). It’s a dish tied to Sunday mornings and special occasions, passed down by grandmothers who soaked the dal overnight and made chutney in a sil batta. Its roots go back to pre-Partition Sindh, where it was made during festivals like Cheti Chand. Even today, in old Sindhi neighbourhoods, the dish holds space at family tables, quietly reminding everyone of the kitchens that once ran without recipes.
None of the chana dal recipes are flashy, and they rarely feature on restaurant menus or are raved about. But for many Indians, their flavours are etched somewhere deep in a core memory from childhood, linked to a certain kitchen, a certain plate, a certain hand stirring a pot while talking about the weather. Chana dal, in its many regional avatars, carries the weight of old stories, quiet customs, and kitchens that cooked without shortcuts. And in every spoonful, there’s a bit of that past which is still warm, still alive.
