Easy, slow cooker Dal Makhani recipe, cooked overnight in a crockpot and tastes just like restaurants and dhabas. This black dal is perfect with rice and tandoori rotis!
Another easy peasy recipe – Slow Cooker Dal Makhani for all you dal makhani lovers! Are you going all like – one more slow cooker recipe? I promise this is is not the last in the series!
Guys I can’t help it. My slow cooker is seriously the best thing that happened to me in a long time. And as a friend recently pointed out, slow cooker dal makhani is genius! Coz dal makhani was originally made over an open wood fire. It was slow cooked all night so that you had all the delicious smoky flavors of a real dal makhani, and creamy, melt in your mouth dal that just screamed your name by morning!
And that’s exactly what we are doing here. Slow cooking this dal makhani all night or all day, and keeping it warm in the slow cooker till you are ready to eat. You’ll be amazed at how no work little work goes into making this dal makhani recipe!
At home, we are all dal makhani pros. Like my mum makes amazing dal makhani and so does the sis and I’m hoping I’m joining the team with my slow cooker version. All this while we’ve made dal makhani in a pressure cooker, because it’s fast and easy and just gets the job done. Till we discovered how much easier it is to make dal makhani in a slow cooker. Side note: if you don’t own a slow cooker, I have a pressure cooker version coming soon!
I’m seriously considering getting my mum one too because I think everyone needs one. Christmas present for mum? Yay or nay?
Unlike most slow cooker dal makhani recipes on the internet, this one doesn’t require you to do any prior cooking. You just dump everything in and let it simmer till you are ready to eat.
Usually, Denver’s my officially taste tester. But this time I went a little further with a really happy facebook experiment. We tested this recipe multiple times, making sure it was just right which meant a LOT of dal makhani and no space to keep it in my tiny refrigerator. I need a bigger one, I swear I do! So I posted a picture of this slow cooker dal makhani on facebook, letting people know that it was up for grabs. Surprise surprise! It was claimed in under a minute. Which makes me wonder if I should give away food on facebook more often. Plus major potential for second level feedback – Denver’s always going to be first level guys. He’s my man!
Usually a dal makhani recipe would have lot of onions, but I think the slow cooked version doesn’t really need them. The lentils cook so long that they break down and add their own flavor without needing onions to boost it up. So I’ve done away with them, but if you want, feel free to add one chopped onion to the recipe.
Also, if you are making some slow cooker dal makhani, make sure to try my Instant No Yeast Naan and Bombay Potatoes to go with it. It’s pureeee perfection that combination. And will make you sleep like a baby after! Sunday afternoon sorted.
Easy Slow Cooker Dal Makhani
Equipment
- Slow Cooker
Ingredients
- 1 cup Urad dal whole black gram lentils
- 1/2 cup Rajma kidney beans
- 1 Bayleaf
- 1 Cinnamon Stick
- 3-4 Cardamom Pods
- 3-4 Cloves
- 1 tablespoon Ginger finely chopped
- 8 Garlic Cloves finely chopped or minced
- 2 Green Chillies slit lengthwise
- 1 tablespoon Coriander Powder
- 1/2 teaspoon Turmeric Powder
- 1/2 teaspoon Red Chilli Powder
- 4 Tomatoes diced (large)
- 1 teaspoon Garam Masala Powder
- 2 tablespoons Butter + extra
- Salt to taste
- 1/4 cup Cream
- 1 teaspoon Kasuri methi optional
Instructions
- Soak both the lentils (urad dal/whole black gram and rajma/kidney beans) in water overnight or at least for 6 hours. This needs to be done only if you are using dry lentils.
- Add all the ingredients to the slow cooker (except cream and kasuri methi) along with four cups water. Stir well. Cook on high for 8 hours or low for at least 12 hours till the lentils are cooked through and can be easily smashed between your fingers.
- Mix well and lightly mash everything with the back of a ladle or spoon. Add the cream and kasuri methi if using and cook on low for another 20 minutes. Top with more butter and serve hot. If serving later, you can keep this on warm for up to 3 hours. Just thin with a little water or milk before serving if it's too thick.
Nutrition
Try these with the Slow Cooker Dal Makhani:
Whole Tandoori Baked Cauliflower
Dan says
May be a stupid question…. But do you crush/grind the cloves and cardamom pods or just leave them to do their thing whole? Thanks!!!
Richa says
Hey! Just leave them whole
Preet says
This is the easiest recipe for busy day and really delicious with no compromise on taste. Thank you.
Raja says
Hi Richa,
Just a quick question: what type of cream did you use? Single cream or heavy cream?
Also, would you brown the onions before adding them or just add them raw if I wanted to add onions? Thank you.
Richa Gupta says
Hey Raja! This dal makhani recipe is all about indulging, so pick full-fat cream for extra flavour!
You could brown onions and add them directly to the dish, OR you could serve raw chopped onions along with the dish to munch on separately!
Pooja Premkumar says
OMG. My husband and I love Dal Makhani and are always weary while ordering it at a restaurant because we don’t know who’s got it perfectly right.
I made it using this recipe and OMG! It was the best we’ve had so far lol! Simple and brilliant. Thank you Richa 🙂
Richa says
So happy you liked the recipe Pooja. Thanks for leaving a comment!
Jon says
Wow! I have never cooked dahl before and was SO sceptical about this recipe – surely it couldn’t be as easy as that? Every other recipe online is so complex. But this is seriously amazing. I too added an onion (browned in a pan beforehand) and some tomato paste, and I pureed the tomatoes in a blender before adding. I also only used one green chilli (partially removed seeds and membrane) but the heat was perfect. But aside from that, I followed recipe exactly and it came out every bit as good as all the other comments are saying. This is a new winter staple for me. Thank you!
Richa Gupta says
So happy to hear that, Jon! We can’t get enough of dal makhani too! You should try our other Indian curries and biryani!
Ethel says
I didn’t see any mention of boiling the beans before placing them into the slow cooker. This can cause bean poisoning, particularly with kidney beans. If they are slow cooked they become 4x more poisonous.
Richa says
Ethel you don’t need to boil the beans before adding them to the slow cooker because they’ll boil/cook in it – that’s the whole point. But to avoid indigestion and to help our body digest complex sugars such as oligosaccharides, we’ve recommended soaking the beans for 6 hours in the recipe.
Jasleen Kaur says
This was soooooo good!! Unbelievably easy and super yum! I just added some extra tomato puree to the ingredient list. I used the slow cook option on mealthy – cooked on slow for around 10.5 hours, opened & gave it a stir once. I then slow cooked on high for another 3 hours. Thanks a bunch, I’m never cooking dal makhani another way now!
Richa says
Wohooo! So happy you enjoyed this!
Margaux Dodemant says
This recipe is great, delicious and easy. I have been consistently making this dish that I love every month since I’ve discovered this recipe on your website. Thank you so much! With by boyfriend, we bought a new slow-cooker so we could make more dal makhani. That’s how much we love it!
Richa says
Woww!! You really did love it. Soooo happy you liked the recipe Margaux! Thank you for leaving a comment
Arushi says
My lentils were not cooked in 9 hrs
Richa says
Hey Arushi, that can happen if your lentils are too old. The problem with lentils is that their age can affect the cooking time. I would recommend just cooking it for longer.
Sree says
I tried using instant pot as slow cooker to make this recipe but that was a big flop 🙁 this was the first time I tried my instant pot as slow cooker and Rajma was not at all cooked and very hard after keeping it for 12 hours in slow cooker mode . I followed exactly your recipe as is but I guess instant pot is not so good as slow cooker after all . There is nothing wrong in your recipe though so I’ll try stovepot version of this recipe in instant pot 🙂
Richa says
Hey Sree! Honestly the slow cooked function on the instant pot doesn’t work well. I have an instant pot version of this recipe on the site. Give that a try: https://myfoodstory.com/dal-makhani-recipe/