Wholemeal Naan

 After the family's huge tick of appreciation for the plain flour naans, I embarked on the wholemeal naan recipe as it is a bit more healthier than the plain flour one. I found that the dough for the whole meal flour gets drier and is not quite as soft as the plain flour.  This is the reason I have used milk as the wetting agent rather than water.  Never the less, it tasted absolutely great and if I had not made the plain flour naans first, I would not have been able to distinguish the minor differences.  I have also become much more adept at cooking these by myself and did not need an assembly line like the first time! Obviously you can dress them up whatever way you want - and I just wanted to use nigella and sesame seeds this time.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups warm milk in a bowl (slightly warmer than body temperature)
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 2 sachets of Tandaco dry yeast  
• 4 cups atta flour  + More for dusting
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1/4 cup plain yogurt
• 2 tablespoons oil
• 1 tablespoon of nigella seeds
• 1 tablespoon of sesame seeds
• 1/4 cup butter, softened, or ghee, to brush the naans
• 1 Indian Tawa (though this can be made in the oven under the grill or the open flame on top of a mesh grill)
• 1 or 2 tablespoons of water, if needed

Method:

To the bowl of warm milk, add the sugar and dissolve. Now add the two sachets of yeast, cover the bowl and set it aside for 10 minutes.  In 10 minutes, the milk should look frothy and smell delicious:

In a large bowl, add 4 cups of  atta flour and 2 teaspoons of salt.  Mix well.  Next add the activated yeast milk and start mixing in the flour.  

Add yogurt bit by bit - you may not have to use all of it - until you get a soft, moist and springy dough.  The dough should not be dry. I had to add an extra tablespoon of water to make the dough moist.  Knead the dough well, make it into a ball.  

Add 1 tablespoon oil on the dough and smoothen it out. Grease a bowl with about a tablespoon of oil and place the oiled dough inside it.  Cover with a lid and keep in a warm place for the dough to double in size.

In about an hour or so, your dough should have doubled in size like this:

When the dough is ready, use your hands and make fist sized balls and keep them ready. I got 14 dough balls out of 4 cups of flour.  Keep a cup of water with a pastry brush ready too.

Use a wooden board, dust it with flour and roll out the dough ball gently into an oblong shape.  You can use your fingers to pull it into shape.  Add a generous pinch of nigella seeds and sesame seeds and using the rolling pin, press it to the top of the naan.  Place the tawa on the stove to get hot.

When the tawa is hot, gently get the naan bread off the wooden board and flip it so that you have the non decorated side on your palm.  Using the pastry brush, wet the back of the naan with water.

Place the wet naan, wet side on tawa pan gently pulling it to shape as you do it.

When you see the naan bubbling up, you are ready to turn the tawa upside down and cook the top of the naan directly on the gas flame.  Since the naan is wet and the pan is an iron pan, it will not fall off.

When you see the dark brown spots appear on your naan, it is ready to be taken off the tawa.

Use a spatula to take the naan off the pan, Brush the naan with a little softened butter / ghee while it is still hot.

Continue with the rest of the dough balls.  

We had these naans for lunch with goat trotter curry for dinner - perfectly spongy to mop up all the juices of the curry. 

Note:  The tawa cost $20.00 at my local Indian Grocery store and was well worth the small investment.