Carrying on from my last post, time to blog eloquently about the third Indian flatbread I had a go at making. You can find the earlier two, Naan & Tandoori Roti, in this post here. While the naan I made is a leavened bread but not with yeast, the tandoori roti is unleavened. This current flatbread, ‘KhameeriRoti‘, is also leavened, & yeast is the rising agent in this case. (‘Khameeri‘ means fermented.)
This is a rustic, moreish flatbread, made entirely with wholewheat flour (aata) & has delicious crust. Like most baked flatbreads, it tastes best eaten hot out of the oven. The dough is kneaded twice; the second kneading is a little involved as you try & incorporate extra liquid into the dough. This results in a smooth silky dough, which is then left to rise. It’s a nice bread to serve with curries, vegetarian or non-vegetarian.
KhameeriRoti (Leavened Bread) from ‘The Indian Menu Planner’ Ingredients: Wholewheat flour – 2 cups Clarified butter (ghee) to grease baking tray. (I line the tray with foil instead) Salt to taste Active Dried Yeast – 1 1/2 tsp Flour to dust Method:
Dissolve the yeast in 1/2 a cup of warm water, & leave to proof.
Sieve the flour with salt onto a platter.
Make a well & pour in about 3/4 cup of water, mix gradually & knead to a tough dough. Add a little more water if required. Cover with a damp cloth & keep for 15 minutes.
Slowly sprinkle the dissolved yeast mixture, & keep kneading till the dough is smooth & pliable & not sticky. Cover with a damp cloth & leave for 30 minutes.
Divide the dough into 8-10 equal balls & dust with dry flour.
Press & flatten into 8″ wide discs. Place on a greased tray & bake for 4-5 minutes in an oven pre-heated at 180 degrees C.
Drizzle with melted ghee or butter(very optional, yet most delicious).
Serve hot with curry.
This rustic flatbread is off for Yeastspotting at Susan’s @ Wild Yeast Blog, for her weekly wrap on yeast baking.
“Blues is to jazz what yeast is to bread. Without it, it’s flat.”
Carmen McRae, Jazz vocalist and pianist
Indian Flatbread … Chapati / Roti
Wrapping it up…fresh,healthy & fun!
Here’s what I did with part of the Turkish Adana Kebabs I made a few days ago. I made Indian unleavened flatbreads, chapati or roti, & made wraps using the kebabs as the filling, with bell peppers, onions, a Yogurt dip & a new discovery…Pomegranate Molasses. Served it with a Mexican corn salad on the side. I find unleavened flatbreads very healthy & versatile. They are made out of whole wheat flour dough only, which just has to be kneaded (as the Daring Bakers tag line comes to mind…We need to knead), no question of leavening agents, prior preparation etc, & above all, no preservatives . I usually leave the dough standing for 30 minutes for the gluten strands to develop…& then am ready to roll!!
A flatbread is a simple bread made from flattened dough. Many flatbreads are unleavened—made without yeast or sourdough culture. They can range from one millimeter to a few centimeters thick. Flatbread was already known in Ancient Egypt and Sumer.
Chapati is a type of Indian bread eaten in South Asia and East Africa. In many areas of South Asia, particularly the north of the subcontinent, and in East Africa, it is the staple food. It is made from a dough of atta flour (whole grain durum wheat), water and salt by rolling the dough out into discs of approximately twelve centimeters in diameter and browning the discs on both sides on a very hot, dry tava or frying pan (preferably not one coated with Teflon or other nonstick material). Ingredients:
Whole wheat flour – 1 1/2 – 2 cups
Water to knead
Sauteed bell peppers with onions (all sliced); saute in a little oil for just 4-5 minutes till crisp tender.
Pomegranate molasses (recipe at the bottom) Mexican Corn Salad
Method:
Put the flour in a big bowl, add enough water to make a firm, softish dough.
Knead firmly for 5-7 minutes; it should feel pliable & come away cleanly from the edges.
If the dough is too sticky, sprinkle on some more flour, 1 tbsp at a time, to get a nice, pliable dough.
Leave to stand for 30 minutes if you have time.
Heat a flat pan / tava to hot.
Make a dough ball about 1 1/2 ” big, dust in flour on both sides, & roll out as thin & as evenly as possible.
Put the rolled out flat bread on the tava. Cook for 1 minute till small bubbles form on the surface, flip it over & repeat.
Now drizzle a little oil (1/4 tsp) & smear it all over & fry briefly on low heat. Repeat on the other side. Keep warm. Make the rest of the chapatis the same way.
Line a chapati with a the sauteed bell peppers & onion. Add some dip, layer it with a kebab or two, drizzle some pomegranate molasses over it…
Wrap it up & serve with a corn salad!
For the MexicanCorn Salad – Toss sweetcorn with finely chopped coriander leaves, finely chopped green chilies, diced deseeded tomatoes, chopped spring onions with greens, lime juice & salt. Add some roasted cumin powder if you like. Serve chilled!
This is my entry for Bread baking Day 7 hosted by Chili und Ciabatta…she says “think of indian chapati, naan, dosa or paratha, of italianfocaccia, ethiopianinjeera, swedishknäckebröd, scottish oatcakes, turkishpide, mexican tortilla, jewish matzo, armenianlavash, south tyroleanVinschgerPaarlen… this list could go on and on”…And that’s exactly what I did!
And now for the Pomegranate Molasses
The fruit chosen by Sra @ When My Soup Came Alivefor AFAMthis month was POMEGRANATE (the red ones are known as KandhariAnaar’s here). This event was started by Maheswari of Beyond the Usual & has a different host each month. I bought a couple the other day & they have been staring me in the face. Read Rachel’s post of a cake she made with it, & wondered what else could come out of it other than juice, salsa, vinaigrette etc. Arundati knows I’ve been under pomegranate pressure because we spoke while I was staring at the fruit!!Making matters worse is that it’s Feb…fewer days!! To cut a long story short…well, I missed the deadline of Feb 25th! (& to end on a happy note…Sra just mailed to say she hadn’t rounded-up yet…so she accepted my pom molasses!! Thank you Sra… YAY!)
Surfing brought me to many recipes…one which caught my attention was Pomegranate Molasses on a blog called Nami–Nami & also on Simply Recipes. ‘Pomegranate molasses’ is a traditional ingredient in Middle Eastern cooking and can be used in a variety of dishes. Here’s a bit of it that I made…mainly for AFAM, but also because I thought it would taste great with the kebab wraps…& it did! It’s like a piquant plum sauce…tangy & beautiful. My pictures don’t do justice to it…because ‘hurry made curry’ this time!! Also, the quantity is very little because we used up quite a bit…story of my blogging life….PHEW!!
Pomegranate Molasses…on the Middle Eastern food trail!
Ingredients: Pomegranates – 4 medium sized Juice of 3-4 limes Sugar – 1/4 – 1/2 cup (as per taste) Method:
Take out the pomegranate seeds ( the red juicy pearls) & blend them in a liquidiser.
Pour them through a muslin lined soup strainer to collect the clear liquid..the yummy juice! Squeeze the cloth to catch as much juice. The colour is to die for. It’s very tempting to abandon all plans & take a swig of the delicious juice…O well!
Put the juice with the sugar & lime juice in a pan & simmer, for 45-60 minutes till beautiful & thick…like molasses. It will thicken a bit as it sits.
Cool & store in a jar in the fridge.
Elise at Simply Recipes says…”You can also mix it with a little orange juice and club soda for a refreshing punch”. Sounds great…the daughter also said I can make a Kool-aid like drink with it! I’ll keep it as a sauce though, thank you; its beautiful like this!!
