Naan
This naan isn’t restaurant-perfect (no tandoor here), but it’s chewy, tender, and close enough. Bonus: makes a fantastic pan pizza dough.
Naan at home is always a compromise. Without a tandoor, you’re never going to get that blistered, smoky restaurant effect, but this recipe gets you close enough that nobody at the table will complain. The dough is soft, chewy, and forgiving, with just enough yogurt to keep it tender and a little slick of oil to help it puff. It’s not fancy—it’s serviceable, reliable, and better than most of what you’ll pay for in plastic wrap at the store. Bonus: roll it a little thicker and you’ve got an extremely serviceable pan pizza dough you didn’t know you needed.
DishStats:
Yield: 6 disks of fluffy, naan-y goodness
Nutritional Info: 187 Calories - 5g Protein - 3g Fat - 35g Carbs
Mise Time - 5 minutes, Stove Time - 20 minutes, max, Wait Time - 80 minutes
Here’s how I do it. Ya’ll do whatever.
Pre-Show Notes:
If you have a tandoor, you’re probably way ahead of the game and really don’t need this recipe. Still, thanks for checking.
If you have a Big Green Egg or similar ceramic cooker, you basically have a tandoor. Good on you.
I don’t so I use a cast iron skillet, though I have successfully pulled off a really decent version using a baking stone and my oven set to broil, allowing the surface of the baking stone to hit around 500°F.
Use Greek yogurt. If you don’t want to, buy regular plain yogurt and dump it into a basket strainer suspended over a bowl all night in the refrigerator. Greek yogurt is just strained yogurt.
If you get your water too hot and you’re in a hurry, mix it with your yogurt to cool it down. That’ll teach it.
Handy Hardware - Not necessary, but makes life easier:
12” Cast Iron Skillet
Dough blade
Digital Scale
Laser thermometer
Basket strainer
Rolling pin
Here’s what’s in my naan:
250 g bread flour
125 ml Filtered water, around 100°F/38°C
60 g Strained yogurt, plain (Greek if you don’t want to strain it yourself.)
15 g Ghee or Low Body Count Olive Oil. Virginity is optional.
6 g Granulated sugar
7.5 g Kosher salt, fine grind
4 g Bread Monkeys (Instant Dry Yeast)
Butter, melted, as needed for brushing
Cilantro, fresh, as needed for garnish
Showtime:
Scale everything!
