I'm working on making decent naan at home. My Indian coworkers are trying to help. It was better the second day after fermenting overnight. I hope that bread flour and a new recipe will improve it even more.
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Ok...several people have asked. The recipe that I used is not good. I'm still working on it. I promise that when I get it right I will post it here for everyone to try.
I used the recipe from this video. I'm not suggesting that the recipe is bad but it did not produce what I wanted which was light, stretchy, chewy naan bread like you get in a restaurant.
In discussing my progress with my Indian coworkers I know that I'm never going to get restaurant tandoor quality naan at home but what I want is to get something better than the dry, stale fake naan that I can buy at my local grocery store.
So...I'm going to try again, this time using 2/3 bread flour (I used all purpose with baking powder, salt, and baking soda to approximate self-rising flour) and 1/3 whole wheat flour. I also bought a bag of nigella seeds...
The pan that I used was a 10" round griddle pan.
It approximates a tawa (or tava depending on how you pronounce it) which is like a small, very shallow upside down wok.
I made up the dough, kneaded it aggressively (I'm a 115 kg farmer and I was sweating in the end) for 15 minutes. I'm talking a two handed, left right knead for 15 straight minutes. I then allowed the dough to ferment at room temperature for 6 hours and cooked half of it. It was not good. I then let if ferment for another 6 hours at room temperature then put it in the fridge overnight and took it out the next afternoon. It was markedly better but still not great.
The process is you divide the dough up into approximately 120 g balls. Let it rest, then put the pan on a high flame (or the highest your stove will go) and heat it up screeching hot, like steak searing hot. Roll your dough out to around 25 cm in diameter, oil the top then flip it over and wet the other side. Rub the water around. You want it to be wet and sticky. Now slap it onto the pan water side down. It will start to bubble up within seconds. Once you have a nice crop of bubbles pick the pan up, turn it over, and hold the oiled side about 15 cm above the flame and move it around in a circular motion. This will obviously not work for a non-stick pan. Once the bubbles are nice and brown set the pan down, use a spatula to unstick it from the pan, and give it a healthy buttering on the bubble side. Pan back on the flame, roll, oil, water, slap, bubbles, invert, brown bubbles, spatula, butter, repeat.
The one that I made this evening after more than 24 hours of fermenting was more chewy. I hope very much that switching to bread flour from all purpose will help. I also plan to let it ferment at room temperature for 24 hours. This is not for the faint of heart given that it has raw eggs in it but I know the chickens that lay them.
You will get a far superior product with a yeasted dough. Try this for example, the yoghurt and fats make it soft and pillowy. Also do an overnight rise for best results.
https://rasamalaysia.com/naan/
Thanks! I found a very similar recipe that leaves out the yoghurt. The first batch that I made got better after sitting in the fridge for 24 hours. I'm going give it another go with some kneading, a room temperature initial rise, then a long rest in the fridge and see if that gets me closer to what I hope for.
I have the ingredients and the similar pan. I will try it this weekend.
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Thanks for sharing, wasn't aware you can use a tawa (or similar) to approximate a tandoor. Will give that a go one day!
My first attempt was lackluster. I don't think the pan was hot enough so the bottom of the naan cooked and released because my pan is really well seasoned before the bubbles really came up. The second time I made the pan screeching hot and it worked much better.
I'm not sure how long it took to cook because I was holding a hot pan upside down over the flame on my stove and hoping that it didn't drop off into the fire. I would say less than a minute total.
Ooof, that does sound scary. I see that you'll be continuing to refine the recipe and process. Look forward to future updates from you!
My latest attempt almost ended in disaster when the naan fell into the fire. I scooped it out, tossed it top down on the pan, and fried it. It turned out pretty good.