What's the best thing about going to your favorite Indian restaurant? Correct! It's the naan, that warm garlicky bread they bring out with the meal. What could be better? Parts of the bread are crisp, other parts chewy, there is the perfect amount of char, and it's always fresh out of the tandoori.
This is a great version of this Indian staple that you can make at home without investing in a tandoori oven. I have made this a bunch of times, and it turns out great. The whole wheat pastry flour adds a bit of nuttiness, and the yogurt lends a nice richness to the dough. Make this the next time you whip up a curry, or use this recipe to make my naan bread pizza.
Whole Wheat Naan
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/4 teaspoon rapid-rise yeast
1/4 teaspoon Maldon salt
3/4 to 1 cup 2% Greek yogurt
The dry ingredients go into the food processor with the dough blade already in place. Turn the processor on and spoon in the yogurt until the dough clumps into a ball and rolls around the bowl. (You may not use the whole cup of yogurt.) Stop the processor, grab the dough, cut it in half, and then cut each half in half again to form four pieces. Roll each piece into a ball. Cover dough with a large bowl, and allow to rise for 30 minutes.
Place pizza stone on the upper-middle rack of the oven. Turn the broiler on medium high and preheat for 20 minutes; this sounds strange, but it mimics the effect of a tandoori oven. Using all-purpose flour to prevent the dough from sticking, roll each dough ball out into an oblong shape that is about 12 inches on the longest side. Pull out the rack containing the stone, place dough directly onto the pizza stone, push the rack back in, and shut the oven door. Allow each bread to cook for about 2-3 minutes or until the top is blistered and brown. Remove naan from the oven. Brush with garlic butter (1 tablespoon melted butter with 1 large clove minced garlic) and sprinkle with Maldon salt and chopped parsley. Serve immediately.
8 comments:
You make it look and sound so easy, but I think I'm still too lazy to use the broiler. The thought of having to take out many pans of naan sounds like too much to me (though you're recipe only makes 4 naan, so that's not bad).
I usually make chapatis to eat with my curry instead. I use a griddle to bake/cook a bunch at a time. :)
I'm with you, naan is the best part of any Indian restaurant. Making it on my own will be even better.
Oh how divine! We actually have a pizza stone too. Thanks for this recipe.
What do you think about flatbreads on the grill? I commonly do them in a cast-iron skillet which forces me to cook just one at a time and it takes forever. I do pizza on the grill, so why not flatbreads where I could do several at once?
i don't have a food pro and i have regular wheat flour. should i just knead it a lot to try to add chew?
Jen, Just kneed it till it's smooth. Should take 5 minutes or so. Not too bad, huh?
I wound up trying this both ways - on a cast iron pan on the stove and on a pizza stone under the broiler. The broiler method worked much better and was close-ish to tandoori naan. Thanks for the tip!
I forgot to ask: is there a reason to not use bread flour for this naan? I noticed that your pizza naan has bread flour, but this has all purpose and ww pastry flour. I was wondering why there was a difference.
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