The apocryphal story goes that the Dal Makhni was made first at Moti Mahal restaurant in Delhi. The practice of adding tomatoes in dal was a Peshawar practice, where the owners of Moti Mahal came from.

Today, I made the Dal Bukhara, it's refined version.

Thread.

The Dal Bukhara was started at the ITC Bukhara restaurant as a rich version of the Dal Makhni.

The differences: Bukhara is slow cooked for a long time, and uses only whole urad dal.

At Bukhara, they cook the dal all night.

I tried to replicate that.

Step by step

Simple ingredients, long process.

First, wash whole urad dal thoroughly. Soak overnight.

Then, cook on slow flame with ginger and green chillies. For 90 minutes or so.

Keep siphoning off the cloudy scum that keeps rising to the top.

Next, cook the tadka.

Fry ginger garlic paste in desi ghee. Add Kashmiri red chilli powder. Add tomato puree.

Once cooked, add this with a dollop of butter to the dal. Mix. Watch your dal get a gorgeous red colour.

Now comes the crux. The long slow cooking.

I cooked this dal on charcoal.

I let it simmer for five hours. Until the embers of 3 rounds of charcoal died out.

Keep stirring it in intervals. Keep adding water to cook more. Mash the dal to thicken it.

This makes the core of the flavor. That's why this needs very few ingredients. The dal shines as it cooks slowly. The more you cook, the better it gets. In fact, at Bukhara they cook it overnight and never take it off the flame/coals.

Once this is done, add toasted kasuri methi (very imp in all Peshawari-Punjabi recipe like Tandoori chicken / butter chicken), add garam masala, salt to taste. Cook a little more on low flame (because why not)

At the end, turn the flame off and mix in fresh cream.

Voila! Dal Bukhara is ready.

Dal Makhni is the story of enterprise born out of the displacement of Partition.

But today it rules Indian menus worldwide.

Rich. Creamy. Decadent. Flavour and history intertwined. All it needs is a little patience.