Papad Cheatsheet ( Sundried Indian crispies)

1001 Rolls

This cookbook lists 1000 easy roll recipes. Think of rolls as tubular sandwiches. Ten types of flatbreads are paired with 10 sauces and use 10 fillings to create a 1000 different rolls. Click the image to view and print the cookbook.

Flatbreads are quick to make and double as a container. Edibles wrapped in a flatbread taste much better than when they are served separately. This magic is what makes rolls like Mexican Burritos and Indian katti rolls so popular. India boasts of a rich collection of flatbreads and all of them can be turned into rolls. Apart from wheat flour, most other flours lack gluten (the glue which makes flour kneadable) and are hard to knead and even harder to roll out. So making rolls with non-wheat flours takes practice. The shortcut is to mix in wheat flour, as listed above. As you gain practice, gradually reduce the amount of wheat flour used. Another trick is to use boiling water to knead these low – gluten flours. The heat partially cooks them to starch and makes them more manageable. Low – gluten flours are also difficult to roll into thin discs. The easy way is to pat them by hand into a thin disc on a well oiled plastic sheet. The disc is peeled off and cooked on a hot skillet (tava).

Off this goes to Divya's Show me your sandwich event.

1001 Sweet Indian flatbreads

Unleavened flatbreads are a staple of  north Indian cuisine. Sweet flatbreads are not very common, but taste delicious. These breads can be thick or thin, small or large, stuffed or plain. They are eaten with a variety of dals or curries and serve as edible cutlery -  being used both as a plate and as a spoon. Wheat is the most common flour used for flatbreads, but different regions prefer different flours. Each state has its own flatbread, mostly made from the locally available grain. Punjab prefers maize flour, Bihar  uses rice flour & Gujarat likes pearl millet flour.  All these flatbreads have their equivalent but thicker Tandoori version where they are baked in a tandoor ( open clay oven). 

Due to scarcity of fuel, India ( and China) did not embrace baking and ovens are very rare in Indian homes. Flatbreads are cooked on a hot skillet and only in restaurants do we get oven cooked breads like the Naan and Tandoor roti.

And this goes to Bread Baking Day - Sweet Breads.

10 flatbreads of the Grand Moghuls

Muglai Cuisine:
Richness defines the royal Mogul (Persian for Mongol) cuisine. Arriving from Central Asia, Moguls ruled most of India for almost 400 years. During this time, their Persian cuisine fused with Indian cuisine and evolved into the Mogul cuisine. Use of Tandoor and the art of leavening flatbreads were Mogul’s gift to Indian cuisine. Unlike traditional Indian flatbreads which are very basic and are cooked on a skillet, Mogul flatbreads are flamboyant- using a variety of rich spices, nuts and cream. They are usually baked in a tandoor or shallow fried in ghee. When cooked on a skillet, they are usually layered. In spite of such rich cuisine, it is interesting to note that Akbar, the greatest Mogul, ate just once a day!

This cookbook lists 10 Mogul breads, greatly simplified, so that a first time cook can easily cook them. The following breads are listed in this cookbook: Click on the links to see more detailed recipes and pictures from my fellow bloggers.

1.:    Naan (Leavened flatbread)  

2.:   Sheermal ( Saffron flavoured flatbread)

3.:   Lachcha Paratha  (Layered flatbread) 

4.:  Warqui Paratha ( Creamy, layered flatbread )

5.:   Mughlai Paratha ( Egg washed layered flatbread ) 

6.:    Badshahi Naan (Deep fried Leavened flatbread) 

7.:   Peshawari Naan (Naan stuffed with nuts & dry fruits)  

8.:   Easy Bakharkhani (Cardamom Flat bread ) 

9.:   Traditional Bakharkhani (Layered creamy flatbread)    

10.:   Cheese Bakharkhani (Sweet layered flatbread)   

10 Coloured Indian flatbreads

Click on the cookbook to view the cookbook.
This cookbook lists 10 coloured chapattis. Natural colouring agents are mixed in with the flour. The following coloured breads are listed in this cookbook: 

1.: Pale brown chapatti  does not use any colouring. The natural colour of all purpose flour gives a pale brown flatbread.

2.:  Golden yellow chapatti uses saffron soaked in warm milk to get its golden hue.

3.:  Yellow chapatti uses turmeric.

4.:  Pink chapatti  gets its colour from beetroot.

5.: Pale orange chapatti uses mashed carrots.

6.:  Green chapatti gets its colour from spinach puree.

7.: Speckled chapatti uses crushed black pepper.

8.:  Pale red chapatti uses tomato puree.  

9.:  Brown chapatti gets its colour from coriander - cumin powder and garam masala.

10.:   Speckled Red chapatti uses the bright red Kashmiri chili powder for its colour.

1001 Leavened Indian Rotis

Leavened Indian Breads : A Primer
Leavened breads are not indigenous to India and are not commonly made in Indian homes. Like China, baking never caught on in India, probably due to the scarcity of fuel. Baking is still viewed as an exotic skill and very few Indian recipes call for baking. Ovens are very uncommon in Indian homes. The only oven used is the Tandoor, the open pit clay oven invented in central Asia. Traditional tandoor is a pain to set up, light up and operate. I prefer to use the tabletop electric tandoor which is very convenient and can cook almost everthing a tandoor can.
Any thick bread needs to be leavened, so that it remains soft when baked. Leavening is the process of filling up the dough with a gas. This gas is normally generated by yeast or by baking powder. When dough is kneaded with yeast, you can actually watch it puff up like a balloon in a couple of hours. Baking powder works differently. On heating, it generates carbon di oxide, which inflates the dough from the inside like a balloon. Yeast requires a few hours to work and fill up the dough with gas. So the dough is rested for 3-5 hours before baking. Baking powder works instantly and so breads made with baking powder can be baked rightaway.

Most leavened Indian breads are cooked in a tandoor, though some like the Bhatura are deep fried. All breads listed here are designed to be cooked on an electric Tandoor. If you don’t have an electric tandoor, you can cook these in a preheated oven at its highest heat setting, in a skillet, on a grill or on the walls of a sturdy vessel. They’d taste different, but they’ll certainly be edible !

The Base (Column 1)
Kulcha is very similar to a Naan, but is usually leavened with baking powder and yogurt instead of yeast. Kulchas are often stuffed with a variety of fillings. It is normally shaped as a round disc unlike the teardrop shaped Naan.
· Tandoori roti is a thick , round roti made from wholewheat flour. It is generally leavened by wild yeast by letting the dough sit for a few hours before baking. Baking powder is now used widely in Tandoori rotis.
· The Bati is a unique bread, designed to last. It was the staple travel food of the Rajput warriors and Marwari traders. Tomato sized balls of whole wheat dough are roasted over hot coals and are eaten dipped in ghee. (They can also be cooked in an electric tandoor). Smaller Batis can be cooked without leavening. They may also be cooked in boiling water first and then baked.
· The most popular leavened bread in Asia, the teardrop shaped Naan, was cooked in central Asia long before it found its way into India. Naan is a staple food in countries like Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Uzbekistan & Tajikistan. That is why Naan is not a Hindi word. It is a pan asian word which means bread in all these languages- Persian, Urdu, Uzbek, Uyghur and Burmese. Sesame seeds / onion seeds / cilantro / garlic slivers are occasionally patted on the surface just before baking.
· When you knead Nan dough with semolina, you get a less chewy and more crumbly version of the Naan- the Khasta Naan.
· Rogani Naan is a richer version of Naan kneaded with milk and ghee.
· Khameeri roti is just a Tandoori roti leavened with yeast instead of baking powder. In some regions these are deep fried.
· Sheermal is an orange coloured, saffron flavoured, sweet version of the Naan. Some versions of sheermal use eggs.
· Taftan is a unique bread made from leavened rice flour. Rice flour is not easy to work with and needs quite a bit of practice to knead and shape. Use of some all purpose flour makes it easier to knead and shape.

Flavouring (Column 2)
Column 2 lists various flavourings from 0 to 9, which can be kneaded along with the dough. Most traditional flatbreads stop at 0 and do not use extra flavouring. The flavouring choices are numerous and you can create your signature dish by choosing your favourite flavouring for your bread.

Stuffing (Column 3)
A variety of stuffings listed in column 3 can be used to stuff the dough. Stuffings from 1 to 5 are easy to work with. Others take a bit of practice to master.

Have fun in cooking up your own combinations of new flatbreads !

And that's another entry for Srivalli’s Roti Mela