Lentils and cabbage

Not a very attractive dish, perhaps. But tasy, and when you have a garden full of cabbages, and want a different way to cook it...

Ingredients
red lentils (or yellow split peas) per person
water per person
1 onion
small cabbage for 2 people (or as much cabbage as you want to eat)
oil
ginger
cumin
chilli

Equipment
knife
chopping board
saucepan
frying pan

oven:
1 hr 15 mins (cooking lentils)

This is a minimal recipe. At the end, I suggest some additional or substitute ingredients.

Cooking process

Put the lentils and water in the saucepan, bring to the boil, then turn down to a simmer. It will take about an hour and a quarter to cook. Stir from time to time, and keep an eye on it as the water leavel gets low, as the lentils stick to the bottom, then burn!
Chop the onion. Slice the cabbage thinly. Fry in the fring pan for a bit until starting to brown. Add the spices and fry a bit more. This can be done while the lentils are cooking, then taken off the heat until the last step.
When the lentils are soft, add the cabbage, onion and spices to the lentils, and heat it a bit (if the cabbage has cooled down).

Other ideas

Some of the following ingredients are possible variations.

I cooked this following a recipe (roughly) under the assumption that I was using lentils, as the recipe required. I found out later they were yellow split peas. Still worked!
The original recipe specified freash ginger, green chillis and cumin seeds. I used powdered ginger, chilli and cumin. I also added some powdered coriander, cinnamon and cloves. You could even just use curry powder!
The recipe also specified tomatoes, which I ignored, but you could add it. Or perhaps some lemon juice to lift the stodginess of the lentils.
This recipe is vegan. You could use it as a side dish with meat if you wanted. But it's filling, and has vegetable, starch and protein (the lentils or peas), so could be the main part of a meal. I would add something else as a vegetable or side dish if so, perhaps some yoghurt.