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Lentils, Curried, with Rice and Barley

A slow‑cooked dish of lentils, rice, and barley flavored with curry, vegetables, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Lentils, Curried, with Rice and Barley

Oven, in the book's wordsA very gentle oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very gentle oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Fry the onion until brown with a bunch of herbs.

  2. In a baking dish, combine lentils, vegetables, rice, and barley, all washed and soaked.

  3. Add oil or butter and cover with cold water.

Cook and serve

  1. Place in a gentle oven at 300°F (150°C) and cook for 3-4 hours, stirring occasionally.

  2. Half an hour before serving, add salt, curry paste or powder, brown sugar, and vinegar.

  3. Mix well before serving, remove the bunch of herbs, and serve hot, alone or with meat.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Rice + barleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together568 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Lentils + barleytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together57 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Lentils + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together505 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Lentils
Provide the bulk of the dish and, as they cook, thicken it into a hearty texture.
Rice
Absorbs liquid during the long bake, adding body and softening into the mixture.
Pearl barley
Softens slowly over long cooking, adding chew and thickening the liquid with its starch.
Tinned tomatoes
Add moisture and acidity that balance the curry flavours.
Curry paste or powder
Supplies the main spiced flavour and aroma of the dish.

The step that matters

Adding the seasonings half an hour before serving. Salt and acid added early can toughen the skins of lentils and slow their softening, while adding them late keeps the seasoning fresh and the texture tender. Taste and adjust at the end, since vinegar and salt strengthen as the dish cooks.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, rice, barley, tomato, carrot, celery, butter):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, rice, barley, tomato, carrot, celery, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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