Moroccan Lentil Stew

Moroccan Lentil Stew with beans, carrots, red lentils, garlic and warm Moroccan spices in less than an hour.

Weight Watchers Moroccan Lentil Stew Moroccan Lentil Stew

One of my favorite old Cooking Light Magazine recipe was for a Moroccan chickpea stew that ended up being my first post on my other blog. You know how it goes, you always make your favorite recipes first.

Well, Chickpea stew became a favorite of ours, we’d eat it ALL the time. Over time I started moving away from just using chickpeas to using other filling options too.

Health Benefits of Red Lentils:

Red Lentils are full of health benefits including helping to lower cholesterol by containing high levels of soluble fiber. Lentils help to reduce blood cholesterol since it contains high levels of soluble fiber. They help stabilize blood sugar, promote weight loss and are a source of low cost protein.

Weight Watchers Lentil Stew

Creating flavor without fat:

We use one tablespoon of olive oil here to cook the vegetables and bloom the spices. This allows for great flavors in just 12 calories per serving of fat.

We could have just jumped the ingredients into a pot together and simmered until cooked through but cooking with spices and adding a small amount of fat helps to bring out the flavors a lot more.

How to Make Creamy Soups without Cream:

We also add in cannelini beans into this soup. One of the best creamy soup tricks without using cream is to puree a can of cannelini beans and add it to your soup. The texture is creamy and no added smart points!

Finally, I use a base instead of a regular broth or stock. This allows me to control the strength of the broth to my tastes. When cooking with so many vegetables that are going to soak up flavor (like the lentils and the beans) I make my vegetable broth twice the strength by adding additional vegetable base. I live for this brand and have all the varieties at all times.

Additional non-vegetarian Moroccan Lentil Stew options:

For a point free variation you can 2 cups of add chopped turkey or chicken breast into the soup, just add in an additional ¼ teaspoon of Kosher salt with it to be sure it is seasoned appropriately.

Weight Watcher Bean And Lentil Stew in Pot

Tools used in the making of this Lentil Stew:
Vegetable Base: I almost never buy boxes of broth because I keep the beef, chicken and vegetable version of this Better Than Bouillon.
Dutch Oven: I love this cast iron dutch oven and the top of it doubles as a pan.

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Moroccan Lentil Stew

Moroccan Lentil Stew with beans, carrots, red lentils, garlic and warm Moroccan spices in less than an hour.
Yield 8 servings
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 40 minutes
Total Time 55 minutes

Ingredients
 

  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 1 yellow onion diced finely
  • 3 cloves garlic minced
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
  • 2 teaspoons ground cumin
  • 1 teaspoon ground coriander
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
  • 1 can diced tomatoes 14 ounce
  • 2 cans cannelini beans drained and rinsed
  • 4 carrots peeled and diced
  • 1 1/2 cups red lentils picked and rinsed
  • 8 cups vegetable broth

Instructions

  • Add the olive oil to a dutch oven on medium-high heat.
  • Add the onions and garlic to the pot and cook for 3-4 minutes until translucent.
  • Add in the ginger, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, salt and pepper and stir for 30 seconds.
  • Add in the rest of the ingredients, bring to a boil.
  • Lower the heat to a simmer, cover and cook for 30 minutes.

Nutrition

Serving: 1¼ cups | Calories: 183kcal | Carbohydrates: 31.74g | Protein: 9.45g | Fat: 2.76g | Saturated Fat: 0.41g | Sodium: 576mg | Fiber: 5.6g | Sugar: 4.68g
Weight Watcher Lentil and Bean Stew
Lentil and Vegetable Soup

About the Author: Sabrina Snyder

Sabrina is a trained professional chef who has cooked for private clients for over a dozen years. Experienced in handling dietary restrictions, allergies and picky kid eaters, she's well versed in coming up with healthy, yet flavorful recipes.

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Comments

    1. You can add a third can pureed if you want the stew to be creamier. If you puree one of the two cans already in the recipe, it might feel like there’s not a lot of beans in the stew.

  1. I just adore Moroccan flavors! This stew would be perfect for a cold winter day. 🙂

    1. Red lentils cook faster than other lentils and don’t need to pre-soak. You can find more information on cooking red lentils here.

  2. This stew is terrific! Combo of warm spices and creaminess is so good and comforting. This is definately make again and again! So easy and quick! Thank you!

  3. Used 8 cups of broth & the consistency seems much thinner than that pictured (or expected). Have you heard this before? Will try reducing the amount of liquid next time (I also puréed one of the cannelloni cans.)

    1. Hmm, it’s hard to troubleshoot that from afar but the veggies could have had a lot of liquid to release. You can also always add a bit of cornstarch slurry to it or simmer uncovered. Hopefully it tasted good though!

  4. 5 stars
    So delicious! Thank you! and now I got a potful for the rest the week! Bonus with my schedule! Thank you so much for sharing. Will be one of my new favorites!