• Wash and soak both the dals for an hour. While the dal is soaking, wash and chop the french beans finely. I usually do the chopping work a day ahead.
• Drain and take the dal long with red chilies, curry leaves, fresh coconut, coriander seeds and grind it to a coarse paste. No need to add any water.

Steaming

• In a steamer, steam the ground dal mix and the chopped beans for 10 minutes. I used my idli steamer, and used one half of the steamer plate for the dal mixture and the other half for the vegetable.
• You can also steam them separately in 2 different plates. If you are familiar with your microwave settings for steaming, you can also do in your microwave.
• Once steamed, remove the dal mix and crumble it. I just pressed it roughly with the back of a ladle.

Let us make the Paruppu usili

• Heat oil given under tempering in a heavy bottom pan. Once hot, splutter mustard seeds, add hing, curry leaves and red chilies.
• Add the crumbled dal mix to this hot tempering. Add salt and turmeric powder to this and mix well. Let this cook in a medium flame for 8-10 minutes for the flavors to mingle. You can also cover and cook at this point.
• Once the dal crumble is well mixed with the tempering , add the steamed beans to this and give it a good mix. At this point, check the salt, if needed add and mix well.
• Let tis cook for another 5-8 minutes, preferably covered for the flavors to marry well. Once done, remove the cover, give it a good mix.
• Take it off the stove, and serve it warm with rice.