Rajma chawal
Preparation Time
20 minutes
Cooking Time
80 minutes
Difficulty Level
easy
Meal Type
Lunch
Serves 4
Key Ingredients
- Rajma (Kashmiri red kidney beans)
About This Recipe
Rajma chawal is a plate of rajma masala, red kidney beans in a thick onion and tomato gravy, with plain steamed rice. It is a regular lunch in Punjabi and Kashmiri homes and across North India. This version is built on small Kashmiri rajma, which turns creamy inside while keeping its shape, so a ladleful of mashed beans is enough to thicken the gravy without cream.
The method keeps to a few rules. The beans soak overnight, lose their soaking water and cook in fresh water until each one is soft to the middle; they never reach the plate firm or half-cooked. Their cooking water goes into the masala with them, as the Dietary Guidelines for Indians advise cooking pulses in only as much water as they need rather than draining it off. The masala is onion browned in ghee with cumin, then ginger-garlic paste, tomato and three ground spices, cooked until the ghee separates; kasuri methi goes in last.
Which beans suit the dish is covered in our guide to the types of rajma; the cooker times here are for the small Kashmiri type, so with any other rajma, keep cooking until every bean mashes completely. Our rajma benefits page also covers the side effects, including why the beans must be cooked through, and rajma protein per 100 g, calories and fibre are set out on the nutrition page. Mustard or groundnut oil works in place of the ghee, spoon for spoon.
Ingredient List
Serving Size:
1x
2x
3x
Rajma
- Rajma (Kashmiri red kidney beans) — 1 cup
- Water, for soaking — 4 cups
- Fresh water, for the pressure cooker — 3 cups
- Salt (1 tsp for the cooker, 1/2 tsp for the masala) — 1 1/2 tsp
Masala
- Ghee — 2 tbsp
- Cumin Seeds — 1 tsp
- Onions, finely chopped — 2 medium
- Ginger-Garlic Paste — 1 tbsp
- Tomatoes, pureed — 3 medium
- Turmeric Powder — 1/2 tsp
- Coriander Powder — 2 tsp
- Kashmiri red chilli powder — 1 tsp
- Kasuri methi (dried fenugreek leaves) — 1 tsp
- Coriander leaves, chopped — 2 tbsp
Rice
- Basmati Rice — 1 1/2 cups
- Water, for the rice — 3 cups
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Serving Suggestions
Serve rajma chawal hot, with sliced raw onion, a wedge of lemon and a green chilli at the side of the plate. A bowl of plain curd or cucumber raita and a spoon of mango pickle complete the meal. The same rajma masala also goes with roti or jeera rice. Leftover rajma, kept in the fridge, thickens as it cools; stir in a little water and heat it through once.
Tips for Cooking Rajma chawal
Start the soak the night before: beans soaked for only a few hours stay hard at the centre and cook unevenly. Very old beans may not soften however long they cook, so use a recently packed lot. Keep tomato out of the pressure cooker; it goes into the masala, which meets the beans only once they are soft. Give the masala its full time, until the ghee shows at the edges, or the gravy will taste raw.
Chef’s Note
Choose rajma of one even size so the whole batch softens together. The Kashmiri rajma COWBERRY sells comes from hill farms in Himachal Pradesh and Jammu that use cow-based farming; the beans are small and glossy, picked by hand once fully mature and not polished. On each plate, 75 g of raw rice supplies about 268 kcal and the 50 g of dry beans 150 kcal; the beans give about 10 g protein and the rice about 6 g.
Per serving (approx.): 492 kcal, protein 16 g, carbs 84 g, fat 9.1 g, fibre 11 g. Computed from IFCT 2017 / USDA values for the listed quantities. Measures: 1 cup = 240 ml, 1 tbsp = 15 ml, 1 tsp = 5 ml.
Happy Cooking
!!
ByCOWBERRY
Jul 28, 2026
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