Green Lentils and Puy Lentils

Shoe Lover

Please excuse my ignorance - but can someone tell me the difference between green lentils and puy lentils? Are they different or one and the same?

I can only find Puy Lentils pre-cooked in a bag in Tesco and they seem very dear, I'm wondering if it is possible to substitute with green lentils.

nompere

This website says they're the same thing:

http://www.foodsubs.com/Lentils.html

My local Tesco never has puy lentils these days - so I buy green lentils; "lentilles verts" I think they're labelled.

the beer revolu

I think puy lentils are rounder and firmer than plain green ones.
I'd substitute away.
I would have thought that Tesco would have both, dried.

Little Alex

Puy lentils (also sometimes called French green lentils) are a PDO product and only when they are grown in a particular part of France can then be called Puy. I saw that on a cookery show recently, can't remember which one. These lentils are a blue-green mottled colour. Tesco's lentilles vertes are as far as I can see the exact same thing, but they are grown in Canada and so can't be labelled as Puy.

Green lentils are a different type of lentil again.

nompere

Just back from a trip to Tesco. They have the "ready to eat" Puy lentils, and as the OP said, they're a silly price.

No sign of any dried Puy lentils, but plenty of "lentilles vertes". (Thank you to Little Alex for correcting my spelling in such a subtle way.) Thank you to LA for the explanation as well. Funnily enough, I saw "PDO" in the Irish Times today - I can't recall having seen it before.

Little Alex

nompere wrote: »

No sign of any dried Puy lentils, but plenty of "lentilles vertes". (Thank you to Little Alex for correcting my spelling in such a subtle way.) Thank you to LA for the explanation as well. Funnily enough, I saw "PDO" in the Irish Times today - I can't recall having seen it before.

:eek: Ich bin doch kein Grammatik-Nazi! :pac:

As I am a kind-of-veggie these days I have loads of lentilly stuff and what have you! This is what the lentilles vertes look like, on the left are green lentils and on the right are brown lentils:



A Google Image search for Puy lentils shows ones that look pretty much the same.

Just thought it might help someone in buying the right stuff!

emmet the rover

i have seen these lentels in tesco dried before in the special diet area beside the gluten free flour,rice cakes and such

Shoe Lover

Thanks for the replies! I will give the Lentille Vertes a bash! Cheers!

shrapnel222

where are you based? i know loads of stores that sell puy lentils, and tbh they're a hundred times nicer (although i suppose it might depend on what you are using them for)

Maglight

Puy Lentils are delicious. But they can be hard to find in shops for some reason. Green Lentils are good too, just not as good as Puy. You'll probably find them in shops like Fallon and Byrne. Don't waste your money on pre-cooked, get dried green lentils instead.