Whats for dinner!!!!

Today, while i was sitting here wondering what to write, i got a reminder from my youngest child that i have to cook dinner. Seriously!  Everyday cooking in my house is very healthy.  I believe in the moderation diet, Eat everything but enjoy it in moderation,  use caution when you use your spices salts and fats.  So, today i made something extremely simple, it took me literally 30 minutes start to finish. I know genius right but no its not genius its efficient.  I made steamed rice, daal(lentil curry) and lightly spiced pan fried tilapia. It was light and yum.I got these tilapia loins the other day from Costco.  I took 6 out and submerged them in some warm water.
Rice:
 2 1/2 cup of basmatic rice, clean and rinse add water and cook it however you cook rice.
Than i get 1 cup of red lentils wash and rinse than add  2 cups of water.  Add spices
1 tsp salt
1 tsp chilli or whatever you desire
1 tsp garlic and ginger paste
1 tomato
1/4 tsp turmeric
1 lime juice
boil until the lentils are soft if the lentils are not cooked than add a bit more water and cook until completely soupy, add 2 green chillis , a little bit chopped cilantro and some curry leaves if you have any.  I didn't have any so no curry leaf in my daal..... than tarka it (tarka means to add hot infused oil into a curry)
basically you get a few tbsp oil in a very small pan, add a bit of cumin seeds, mustard seeds some dried chillies and heat it than you directly tarka the hot oil into the lentils soup.
(by the way: give me daal and rice any day and ill be happy, its the ultimate comfort food)

Fish
I remove the fish from the water and i add
1 tsp of salt
1 tsp of chilli powder
2 tsp of cumin powder
1 tsp coriander powder
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp garlic
massage the fish with the dry ingredients add 1/2 cup of flour and toss it so each loin (LOL) is covered with flour.
I get a large pan add a good amount of oil so the fish is submerged half way in.
I heat the oil slowly drop the fish into the hot oil and fry them until they are browned on both sides

You must remember the oil must be pretty hot or if it is even a little bit cooler the fish will become unbelievably oily.  The moment the food starts cooling the oil will start sticking so remove it quickly and place it on mesh or one of those racks so the oil drips off immediately. I obviously did not have that problem, i simply removed it from the pan to the platter without any excess oil stuck to my fish..... years of experience ofcourse.

Even though the above recipe looks like it has a lot of spices it really doesnt because when frying,  most of the spices float away into the oil so you are left with a very mild spiced fish.

happy eating!!!!