• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Recipe Index
  • Food Photography
  • Subscribe

MySpicyKitchen

menu icon
go to homepage
subscribe
search icon
Homepage link
  • Recipe Index
  • Food Photography
    • Facebook
    • Instagram
    • Pinterest
    • YouTube
  • ×
    Home » By Category » Appetizers & Snacks » Baked & Grilled

    Published: Jul 11, 2012 · Modified: Dec 25, 2020 by Usha Rao

    Baked Crunchy Chana Dal & Mung Dal

    Once upon a time, when I was little, fried chana dal was prepared quite often as a snack. Whenever palaharam (snacks with longer shelf life) was made at home, fried chana dal was often on the list. Gradually it disappeared from the list and always wondered why? I liked munching on spiced chana dal as a snack. The dal is soaked in water to make it tender, deep fried in hot oil and seasoned with crushed garlic, chili powder & salt. I liked munching the dal with bites of dried garlic (after few hours, crushed garlic gets dried) chili powder.

    Spicy Crunchy Chana Dal, Baked crunchy mung dal, Blogging Marathon

    When I was looking for deep fried food that can be baked, I remembered this chana dal which I liked a lot as child. I soaked the dal for 4 hours, cooked it little water for 2-3 minutes, drained it and baked for 20 minutes. It turned out crunchy & crispy, almost like deep fried dal. The first time I made it, I was a little disappointed how it turned out but as the dal cooled down, it became crunchy. Since I was a little disappointed, I soaked some mung dal to see how that would turn out. I liked both the spiced dals but preferred chana dal.

    Baked crunchy mung dal, spicy mung dal snack, blogging marathon

    Total Time: 30 – 45 minutes (excludes 4 hours of soaking time)
    Preparation: 10 – 15 minutes
    Baking Time: 20 – 30 minutes

    Ingredients:

    • 1 cup Chana Dal or Mung Dal
    • 1 tbsp. Oil
    • 1 – 1 ½ tsp. Chili Powder (adjust to taste)
    • ¾ - 1 tsp. Salt (adjust to taste)
    • Little Turmeric
    • 2-3 Garlic Cloves (adjust to your preference)

    Preparation:

    • Wash the dal and soak it for at least 4 hours.
    • Drain the water and transfer the dal to a sauce pan. Fill the pan with water, about ½ - 1” above the dal. Cook it on high for 3 minutes. You will see foam forming on the top. We don’t want to cook the dal for too long. Turn of the heat, drain it and run the dal under cold water to bring it back to room temperature. This step can be skipped if using mung dal.
    • Transfer dal to a paper towels or a kitchen towel and pat dry it. Leave it on the towel to dry, for about 5 minutes until the oven is preheated.
    • Preheat the oven to 400F. For mung dal, I preheated to 375 F.
    • Line a baking tray or cookie sheet with aluminum foil.
    • Transfer chana dal to bowl and mix it well with oil, ½ tsp. salt, ½ tsp. chili powder & turmeric. You can also do this directly on the lined baking sheet.
    • Spread seasoned chana dal on the baking sheet and bake it for 10 minutes in a preheated oven.
    • Remove from the over, shake the tray properly or with a spoon mix the dal and spread it evenly on the tray. Put it back in the oven and bake for 5 minutes. Pull it out and repeat the above step. Bake for another 5 minutes or until chana dal turns brown. The total bake time is 20 minutes. However, I felt I should have pulled it out of the oven a minute earlier. Do keep an eye on the dal after 18 minutes into baking.
    • Crush together garlic, ¼ tsp. salt & 1 tsp. of chili powder. Sprinkle it on the baked dal and mix it well. Add the garlic immediately after removing the dal from the over. I made mung dal less spicy and skipped chili powder when crushing garlic.
    • Once the dal is cooled, store in an air tight container.

    Recipes this day in 2011: Pound Cake for Sweet Punch
    Recipes I posted this month in 2008, in 2009, in 2010 and in 2011.

    Blogging Marathon: To know more about the various themes and participating bloggers for this marathon, checkout the blogging marathon page on Srivalli's blog

    Event Entries: I am sending these falafel to Simona's My Legume Love Affair, an event started by Susan, to Nalani's Show Me My Hits: Lentils & Legumes, an event started by Sangeetha and to Pradnya's Bake Fest, an event started by Vardhini.

    More Appetizers & Snacks

    • Masala muri in a cone shaped bag.
      Jhal Muri, Spicy Puffed Rice
    • Bowl of spicy sauce in the middle of the plate, surrounded by fried tofu slices.
      Korean Pan Fried Tofu with Spicy Sauce
    • Prawn pakoda on a brown paper.
      Shrimp Pakoda ~ Fried Shrimp
    • plate of akara.
      Accara Recipe ~ Black Eyed Peas Fritters

    Reader Interactions

    Comments

      Leave a Reply Cancel reply

      Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

      Recipe Rating




      This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

    1. Len says

      April 04, 2016 at 2:20 pm

      Older post but first time I made this. DId the 10/5/3 minutes at 375 with mung dal. Although they came out "sort of" crunchy, they are nowhere like the the store-bought mung dal snacks (much harder compared to the yellow). I do have to say those store-bought ones are yellow lentil not green mung.

      Should there be that much of a difference--ie pretty hard?

      Reply
      • MySpicyKitchen says

        April 04, 2016 at 7:56 pm

        Len, no it should not be that hard. Either the dal was baked for too long or the dal needs to be soaked a little longer. I think latter might be the case. You can either soak the dal a little longer or cook it for few minutes before baking. Hope this helps.

        Reply
    2. Hannah Sinclair says

      January 01, 2016 at 8:03 pm

      Thank you for sharing this, I used it to make Murmura Chivda with puffed rice. Yum! Great instructions 🙂

      Reply
    3. Gunjan says

      October 23, 2014 at 2:26 am

      I made it according to your recipe and though it took longer, it turned out amazing. Thank you for the lovely healthy version. 🙂

      Reply
    4. Kavitha says

      August 07, 2013 at 4:50 pm

      Have you tried this with green whole moong too? Wanted to know the cooking and baking times for it.

      Reply
      • MySpicyKitchen says

        August 31, 2013 at 3:39 pm

        No I have not tried it with whole moong dal

        Reply
    5. anil Reddy says

      July 06, 2013 at 8:01 am

      yum yum....

      Reply
    6. Bhamathy says

      June 05, 2013 at 10:29 am

      Nice presentation. Thanks for visiting mine.

      Reply
    7. neev says

      July 27, 2012 at 10:28 pm

      What a great way of having lentils, am definately going to try making this.

      Reply
    8. Suma Gandlur says

      July 13, 2012 at 7:33 pm

      My family members are great fans of these chana dal. Will try the bakd version next time.

      Reply
    9. sag says

      July 13, 2012 at 5:02 pm

      Hmmm feeling so nostalgic. My mom also used to prepare this when we were kids. Yeah.. somehow it disappeared.
      One reason might be because of deep frying thing i guess. this one is good. I will try this with peanuts.

      Reply
    10. Srivalli says

      July 13, 2012 at 4:53 am

      I love these usha, I guess with store bough snacks becoming so popular..homemade stuffs disappeared..even we don't make these at home these days..

      Reply
    11. Kalyani says

      July 13, 2012 at 12:51 am

      lovely snack - a fav anytime.. bookmarking this baked version..

      Kalyani

      Reply
    12. harini says

      July 12, 2012 at 11:20 pm

      love this snack! I also made moong dal but in the microwave !

      Reply
    13. Cool Lassie says

      July 12, 2012 at 11:03 pm

      The pictures look gorgeous! Lovely crunchy snack!

      Reply
    14. Nalini says

      July 12, 2012 at 5:12 pm

      My all time favorite sounds delicious.....

      Reply
    15. preeti says

      July 12, 2012 at 10:24 am

      Love this crunchy pulses spl with tea or in bhelpuri

      Reply
    16. Kamalika says

      July 12, 2012 at 4:36 am

      This must be a very addictive snack ..

      Reply
    17. Priya says

      July 12, 2012 at 4:33 am

      Beautifully done, wat a guilt free snacks.

      Reply
    18. supriya says

      July 12, 2012 at 3:38 am

      Thanks for the recipe will try it.

      Reply
    19. nirmala says

      July 12, 2012 at 3:00 am

      Looks new to me!!!Never tried ...looks delicious!!!

      Reply
    20. Jayanthi says

      July 12, 2012 at 1:14 am

      Lovely snack to munch on guilt-free.

      Reply
    21. Padma says

      July 12, 2012 at 12:49 am

      It's my favorite too I can enjoy this any time. baked version hummm interesting Usha...

      Reply
    22. Divya Prakash says

      July 11, 2012 at 10:57 pm

      Fried moong dhal has always been my favorite..
      Will definitely try this healthier version..

      Reply
    23. Gayathri Kumar says

      July 11, 2012 at 9:32 pm

      Guilt free baked channa dhal looks so inviting....

      Reply
    24. Mireille says

      July 11, 2012 at 9:10 pm

      love this homemade version

      Reply

    Primary Sidebar

    Hi, I am Usha! Welcome to my space. I am the content creator and photographer here. I love cooking and all the recipes on the site are tried and tested in my kitchen.

    More about me →


    Popular

    • Sq image of a platter of veg canapes.
      Bread Canapes Recipe
    • Shrimp noodle soup in a bowl
      Easy Shrimp Noodle Soup Chinese Style
    • Bowl of baked empanadas with mini bottle of tabasco sauce on the side
      Baked Chicken Empanadas
    • Omani Food, Omani Cuisine, Roasted Meat, Blogging Marathon, Around the world in 30 days with ABC cooking,
      Omani Shuwa ~ Slow Cooked Lamb

    Web Stories

    MySpicyKitchen web stories link

    Finger Food

    • Broiled shrimp.
      Party Shrimp Recipe
    • Tortilla cheese chips, Tortilla cheese crisps, Tucson Cheese Crisps, Blogging Marathon, Tortilla dish,
      Arizona Cheese Crisps
    • Plate of bacon wrapped jalapeno poppers
      3 Ingredient Bacon Wrapped Jalapeno Poppers
    • A platter of Fiesta pinwheels and a bowl of salsa
      Fiesta Pinwheels, Yummy Party Food

    Curry Recipes

    • A bowl of lima beans curry.
      Lima Beans Curry, Video Recipe
    • Bowl of ulligadda ukkera.
      Onion Egg Curry ~ Ulligadda Ukkera
    • A bowl of chikkudukaya kura or Indian broad beans in a platter along with a bowl of rice.
      Chikkudukaya Kura - Indian Broad Beans Fry
    • Gutti vankaya masala is a flavorful eggplant curry stuffed with peanut sesame spice mix.
      Gutti Vankaya Masala - Stuffed Baby Eggplant Curry

    Footer

    ↑ back to top

    About

    • Privacy Policy

    Newsletter

    • Subscribe

    Contact

    • Know Me

    Copyright © 2022 MySpicyKitchen