Want to try Indian cooking? Start with these dishes.

You can read about my cooking journey here, or set off on making these recipes yourself. Make one. Make them all. Host a dinner party. (After all, Indian food is made family-style.)

Most of the ingredients can be found at the local grocery store with the exception of a few: the right kinds of lentils, cumin seeds, ghee, and deggi mirch. The last one is a red-orange spice made from bell peppers and Kashmiri red chilies. Find those at a South Asian shop, like Waltham Indian Market or Apna Bazar in Woburn, Lowell, and Norwood.

Remember: These are my mother’s recipes, so play fast and loose with the measurements. Taste between steps; season with your heart. Each recipe will feed 3-4 people — or just you, with plenty of leftovers.

Rajma chawal, bangaan, and boondi dahi

Rajma

Cooking time: 2 hours after soaking beans overnight

In my opinion, nothing is more comforting than a big bowl of beans. Enter rajma. The kidney beans are slow-cooked and flavored with a tadka, a core technique in Indian cooking that involves blooming spices, onions, and tomatoes in oil to extract all the goodness out of it.

Ingredients:

• 1 pound of Kashmiri rajma
• Salt and pepper, to taste.
• 1 medium red onion
• 2 roma tomatoes
• Half a head of garlic
• Handful of Cumin seeds
• A small piece of ginger
• A half spoon of deggi mirch
• A spoonful of ghee

Recipe:

1. Wash the beans thoroughly 2-3 times. The runoff should be tinted brown. Soak overnight with plenty of water.

2. The next day, toss the beans into a pressure cooker and add a healthy serving of salt and pepper. Cover, and let them boil on high-heat for 5-7 minutes. The whistle of the cooker should go off three times.

3. Turn the heat on the pressure cooker to low-medium, and let simmer for 1 hour. The whistle should go off intermittently.

4. In the meantime, make the tadka:

a. Roughly chop the onion, ginger, and tomatoes.

b. Blend the onion and ginger until semi-solid without chunks. Blend the tomatoes separately.

c. Mince the garlic. Toast the garlic with vegetable oil in a pan until golden brown, then add a handful of cumin seeds.

d. Toss in the onion mixture, and let cook for 10 minutes covered. Stir occasionally.

e. Add the tomatoes and deggi mirch. If the mixture is looking too chunky at this point, use a spatula to break apart.

f. Cook tadka until golden brown. (You’ll know it’s ready when the mixture begins to secrete oil of its own that will pool at the bottom of the pan.)

5. Mix the tadka into the boiled beans when they can be easily smashed. Let simmer for 5-10 more.

6. If the rajma is thicker than intended, add cups of boiled water. If you do so, you may need to add more salt and spices to even things out.

7. Serve over rice with a spoonful of ghee.

Circle bangaan

Cooking time: 30 minutes

It is fried eggplant — simple as that. This recipe doesn’t pretend to be more than it is, and it’s delicious. It should melt in your mouth when finished.

Ingredients:

• 1 medium eggplant (The lighter, the better. You want the eggplant to have as few seeds as possible.)
• Vegetable oil
• Unflavored yogurt
• Deggi mirch
• Turmeric
• Mango powder (or lemon juice)
• Salt and pepper, to taste

Recipe:

1. Cut the eggplant into 1 to 1½ inch circular slices, and spread them on a large tray or baking sheet.
2. Coat the pieces lightly with yogurt, salt, pepper, deggi mirch, mango powder (or lemon juice), and turmeric on both sides. It should appear yellow afterward.
3. Let sit for 10 minutes, until the eggplant has let out its water content.
4. Heat vegetable oil in a deep pot that can be used for frying on medium-high heat. When the oil begins to pop, turn down to low-medium heat.
5. Place a few pieces of eggplant into the oil without crowding the pan.
6. Let fry for 10-15 minutes each, flipping occasionally. It’ll be done when the eggplant is golden brown, and the purple skin begins to crinkle.

Boondi dahi

Cooking time: 15 minutes

Dahi is just yogurt with a twist. It’s traditionally eaten with a host of meals and serves as a chilled and creamy counterpart to the other dishes on the plate. I will also say from experience: There is no shame in just eating plain yogurt with Indian food. But boondi dahi is a way to switch it up.

Ingredients:

• Tub of unflavored yogurt (I used a 32 oz container of Stonybrook Probiotic yogurt)
• 1-2 cups of whole milk
• A few handfuls of boondi
• Cumin powder
• Salt and pepper, to taste
• Cilantro

Recipe:

1. Whisk 1-2 cups of milk with most of the tub of yogurt in a mixing bowl. Thin down the dahi to the desired consistency.
2. Stir in salt, pepper, and a dash of cumin powder.
3. Add a few handfuls of boondi, and let sit for 10 minutes. Do not stir.
4. Mix together, and garnish with chopped cilantro.

Mama’s Rice

Cooking time: 30-40 minutes

There are a million ways to make rice, but my mother adds a touch of cumin seeds and does the steps out of order of what I’ve seen traditionally.

Ingredients:

• Basmati rice
• Cumin seeds
• Vegetable oil

Recipe:

1. Wash rice twice in a mixing bowl. Then add double the water content.
2. Toss cumin seeds into a pot with vegetable oil.
3. When the cumin seeds are aromatic, add the rice and water mixture directly in.
4. Bring to a boil. Then cover and simmer until soft.

Meal 2: Gobi aloo and maa ki daal (with frozen naan)

Gobi aloo

Cooking time: 40 minutes

This recipe reduces two hearty vegetables — potatoes and cauliflower — into soft and flavorful morsels. They’re pan-roasted with a mixture of spices.

Ingredients:

• Vegetable oil
• 2 cloves of garlic
• Handful of cumin seeds
• 1 medium red onion
• 2-3 golden potatoes
• 1 head of cauliflower
• Spices: Garam masala, turmeric, deggi mirch, and salt and pepper, to taste
• Cilantro

Recipe:

1. Cut the potatoes into bite-sized pieces. Dice the onion. Break the cauliflower into individual florets. (They will shrink during the cooking process.)
2. Brown two cloves of minced garlic in a pan with vegetable oil on medium heat.
3. Toss in a handful of cumin seeds, then add the diced onion. Let it cook down.
4. Add the potatoes. Let cook for 5 minutes.
5. Coat the potatoes in the salt, pepper, deggi mirch, and turmeric. The potatoes should be yellow-orange. (Warning: Adding too much deggi mirch will make the dish sharper and spicier.)
6. Toss in the cauliflower.
7. Cover the pan for 15 minutes, lifting occasionally to stir.
8. Add a dash of garam masala. Let cook again for another 5 minutes.
9. Garnish with chopped cilantro, and serve.

Maa ki daal

Cooking time: 2 hours after soaking beans overnight

Translated to “mother’s lentils,” this dish comes with the warmth of home. It was my favorite growing up. Maa ki daal can be eaten alone, but pairs beautifully with most Indian vegetables and either rice or naan. (This recipe closely resembles the rajma.)

Ingredients:

• 1 pound of uraad daal
• ¼ pound of kashmiri rajma
• Vegetable oil
• 1 clove of garlic
• 2-3 roma tomatoes
• 1 medium red onion
• Deggi mirch
• Salt and pepper, to taste
• Cilantro

Recipe:

1. Wash the beans thoroughly 2-3 times. The runoff should be tinted brown. Soak overnight with plenty of water.

2. The next day, toss the beans into a pressure cooker with more water. Add a healthy serving of salt and pepper. Cover, and let them boil on high heat for 5-7 minutes. The whistle of the cooker should go off three times.

3. Turn the heat on the pressure cooker to low-medium, and let simmer for 1 hour. The whistle should go off intermittently.

4. In the meantime, make the tadka:

a. Roughly chop the onion and tomatoes. Mince garlic.

b. Blend the onion until semi-solid without chunks. Blend the tomatoes separately.

c. Toast the garlic with vegetable oil in a pan until golden brown.

d. Toss in the onion and tomato mixture, and let cook for 10 minutes covered. Stir occasionally.

e. Add deggi mirch. If the mixture is looking too chunky at this point, use a spatula to break apart.

f. Cook tadka until golden brown. (You’ll know it’s ready when the mixture begins to secrete oil of its own that will pool at the bottom of the pan.)

5. Mix the tadka into the boiled beans when they can be easily smashed. Let simmer for 5-10 more.

6. If the daal is thicker than intended, add cups of boiled water. If you do so, you may need to add more salt and spices to even things out.

7. Serve over rice with a spoonful of ghee.

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Diti Kohli can be reached at [email protected] her on Twitter @ditikohli_.