Homemade Naan Bread - in the bread maker

I had always thought that Naan bread was one of those things that you could never make at home without it tasting unauthentic, even the ones you can buy from the supermarket bakery never taste quite the same as those from the curry house.

However, after the success of the pizza dough from my humble Hinari breakmaker, I decided to try making some Naan bread to go with my Tarka Dal (I know that most Indians would eat Tarka Dal with roti, but I like eating it with Naan).

I'm glad I did! The Naan bread was very easy to make...pop all the ingredients in the bread maker, put on the "dough" setting, turn on and about 3 hours later you have dough that's ready to go! Put it in the fridge (wrapped in cling film) for up to 3 days or use right away. The best thing about it is that once you've got the dough ready, the Naans literally only take 2-3 minutes to cook on each side under a hot grill. Actually, that's a lie... the best things about these Naan breads are that they taste fantastic!

I've made the Naan bread a couple of times and have experimented a bit with the recipe. I've added a couple of extras to make it tastier but it's still very good plain.

Here's my recipe for making Naan bread in a bread maker.

Naan Bread (for bread making machine)
Makes 6 small Naan

Ingredients:
4 tbsp natural yogurt
1 tbsp olive oil
150ml water
350g strong white bread flour
1 tsp caster sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp garlic granules (optional)
1/2 tsp ground coriander (optional)
1/2 tsp cumin seeds (optional)
1/2 tsp fast action dried yeast

25g butter or garlic butter

Method:

• Place all the ingredients, except the butter, into the bread pan in the order listed.
• Select the "Dough" programme on your bread making machine and turn on.
• At the end of the cycle (with my machine this takes just over 2 hours), remove the dough from the pan and place on a floured work surface.
• Knock back the dough
• Divide into 6 pieces
• Melt the garlic butter or butter in a small pan.
• Pre-heat the grill. I put some greased tin foil on my grill rack.
• Roll out each piece into an oval shape.
• Place onto the prepare grill rack. With a pastry brush, coat the top of the Naan with melted butter.
• Grill for 2-3 minutes, keep an eye on the bread the whole time as it does cook very quickly and can burn if you're not careful.
• Turn over and repeat the above step for the other side.

Serve hot with curries or dal :-)