Naan
Everyone should have a go at making naan, they're relatively easy to make,
don't involve any complicated shaping, are quick to bake and, most
importantly, taste great.
I haven't played around with different formulas, so there's plenty of room
for experimentation here but these are based on Madhur Jaffrey's and they
taste pretty good. The ingredients and method can be found here:
http://uktv.co.uk/food/recipe/aid/534227. The only change I've made is to
leave out the egg, I thought it was probably unnecessary.
To make these authentically you need a tandoor oven, where the temperature
can reach 480C and you risk severe arm burns putting them in, but
thankfully I had to make do with a regular oven. I cranked the oven up to
its highest setting, 250C on the CircoRoast setting, let the pizza stone
heat up for 15 minutes or so and then started the bake. I find that this
method gives a fast bake and I don't need to use the grill as the article
suggests.
I like to make the naan fairly large simply because it cuts down on the
work to roll them out, I guess I'm lazy. I can fit two at a time on the
rectangular pizza stone, while they're baking I've just got enough time to
roll the next two out; this way I form a production line of rolling,
baking, rolling etc. They really don't take very long to bake, three
minutes perhaps, and you have to watch they don't burn as once they start
to take on colour they can soon go too far.
You can leave them plain or, as in the photograph, you can melt some butter
or margarine, chop up some coriander and then brush it on whilst they're
still hot.
Once they're cool you can freeze them and they will keep really well, just
revive them from frozen by popping them in the toaster.
