Though I have always been a baker of sweet treats (pies, cakes, cookies and the like), I have never jumped into the world of bread making. Until now. With Chicken Tikka Masala cooking in the crockpot, we decided to step up our game by making some homemade naan. We used this recipe from Once Upon A Chef due to its apparent simplicity. We chose not to use the anise seeds the first couple tries, though I think it would be a fun addition next time!
The process was pretty easy, though the dough was always stuck in uber sticky mode. A little extra flour made the naan too dense and with the seemingly proper amount, it was a little tricky to work with. The dough rose for 2 hours, so maybe longer could be better? We will have to keep experimenting. One thing we definitely learned the hard way, is to not pre-roll out the 6 portions of naan while one is cooking in the cast iron pan… It’s bad news and you’ll just have to reroll it. Of the two times we have made this so far (one was a half recipe, which, good news, it worked really well!), the naan came out the most evenly cooked and with the perfect fluffy texture when we rolled out the oval of dough immediately before putting it in the hot pan. We ultimately found that cooking it 3 minutes on the first side and 2 minutes on the second was just about right.
This naan was delicious – maybe almost too good as we couldn’t stop eating it. Sticky dough flubs and rerollings aside, it was soft, warm, pillowy and paired really well with our entree. If you have a two hour window to let the dough rise, I think this Homemade Naan is worth every second.