Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Shallot and cumin naan

Sometimes we need some spices to perk up our day, like my yesterday. So I decided to add shallot and cumin in naan, and deep-fried spicy meat balls wrapped in banana leaves. This naan supposed to be Persian style, but I would like to know how it's different from the famous Indian naan. It's very very good though, hope one day I'll own a tandoor just for making this flat bread (oh, and a brick oven for pizza!).

Ingredients for naan (yield 8 pcs):

2 tsps dry yeast, dissolved in a 1/4 cup lukewarm water

2 cups water (more or less depending the humidity and climate)

5 1/2 cups high gluten flour (bread flour)

1 Tbp salt

A few spoonfuls of finely chopped shallot

some cumin

some coarse salt

Steps:

  1. Mix the yeast water, flour, 1 Tbp salt and enough water, knead until the dough smooth and elastic. Rise the dough in refrigerator overnight.
  2. Bring the dough to room temperature. Place baking stone in oven and pre-heat the oven to 500F.
  3. Divide the dough into 8 pieces. Floured the work table, slightly flatten the dough by stretching it from the center. If it resists to stretch out, let it rest (covered) for a few mins and you start on working the others.
  4. After the 8 doughs stretched out like disk, lay them on the floured peel (the back of baking sheet for me). Dip all your fingers with water, press your fingertips into the dough (but leave a 1.5 inch border) to make deep indentations and further thin out the center area. Sprinkle each center with coarse salt, shallot and cumin.
  5. Slide the bread onto the hot baking stone and bake for 6 - 8 mins or until the top turns slightly golden.

I didn't follow any recipe to make these meat balls, only guided by my taste and eyes. Mix the chopped meat with finely diced chilli, shallot, turmeric, cinnamon and mustard powder, shaped, wrapped in banana leaves (cut into strips), deep-fried in medium heat.

5 comments:

  1. Your food and pics are always a feast for my five senses ;) The meatballs reminds me of pandan chicken.

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  2. Angie,
    I haven't ever seen pandan chicken, but I always had deep-fried chicken (piece) wrapped in banana leaves in Thai restaurants. Wish I could get some pandan leaves here...

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  3. For Indian naan, usually yogurt or milk is added to the dough. Except for that, we do prepare it like you detailed here.
    The Persian naans looks gorgeous and well baked.

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  4. Indira,
    thank you for the comment and the info! When I like one food, just want to know everything about it... now you answer the question that has been kept in my mind for these years!

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  5. Wow ! gattina , your shallot and cumin Naan looks so picture perfect!I am glad your love for indian food is going so great , turning out a feast to my eyes.....:)

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