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A Guide To The Breads of India: Lucky Peach

This document provides an overview of various breads found across India, with a focus on regional differences between North and South India. In the North, popular breads include naan, bhatura, kulcha, rumali roti, paratha, and sheermal. Southern breads include dosa, neer dosa, Mangalore buns, appams, and idiyappam. The bread traditions reflect India's diverse cultural and trade influences over history from Central Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.
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50% found this document useful (2 votes)
638 views32 pages

A Guide To The Breads of India: Lucky Peach

This document provides an overview of various breads found across India, with a focus on regional differences between North and South India. In the North, popular breads include naan, bhatura, kulcha, rumali roti, paratha, and sheermal. Southern breads include dosa, neer dosa, Mangalore buns, appams, and idiyappam. The bread traditions reflect India's diverse cultural and trade influences over history from Central Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 32

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A GUIDE TO THE BREADS OF INDIA

December 7, 2016 – Lucky Peach

If you’ve eaten at an Indian restaurant anywhere in the world, chances are you’ve
mopped up a red slick of butter chicken with a folded wedge of naan. And yet that
ubiquitous flatbread, like so much else that defines the cuisine of the subcontinent
(potatoes, tomatoes, chilies, tea), is really a foreign dish, prepared using refined
flour, which came across the Himalayas from central Asia in the twelfth century,
along with Muslim settlers. Before that, North India’s unleavened wheat-based
flat breads—rotis, chapatis, and puris—would have been made from whole
grains, while the rice-eating South elaborated its own distinct set of breads from
batters of rice and lentils.

Like so much else in India, the bread traditions vary along a North-South/wheat-
rice axis (with other grains like sorghum, millet, amaranth, and semolina making
occasional appearances). But the staggering diversity of India’s breads also
reflects a long history of trade and invasion, of cultural and culinary syncretism. It
would be virtually impossible to capture the full diversity of India’s breads (though
Saee Koranne-Khandekar makes an admirable attempt in her new book
Crumbs!), or even to say what, in India, counts as bread. But here we’ve given it
a go. I went about it like this: if it’s starchy and used as a utensil, it’s bread.

Glossary
Atta: whole-wheat flour
Maida: refined flour
Jaggery: unrefined cane sugar
Tawa: a round metal cooking utensil, sometimes flat, sometimes slightly
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concave
Tandoor: an earthen oven

NORTH

Bhatura

Maida is kneaded with yogurt and either ghee or oil then left to leaven. It’s rolled
flat and broad and deep-fried until it puffs up and turns golden brown (the best
are like crisp, steam-filled beach balls, only slightly smaller). Often, bhatura
comes with chana masala,spiced chickpea curry, as the famous North Indian
snack chole bhature.

Where: All over North India


With What: Chole (spiced chickpea curry)

Kulcha

Kulchas, made from the same dough as bhatura and principally from the
northwestern state of Punjab, are sometimes baked but usually cooked on a tawa,
yielding a supple, chewy bread very similar to naan. In Kashmir, which has
perhaps the richest bread-making tradition in all of the subcontinent (due to its
proximity to central Asia), the same word describes a hard, round bun—
sometimes sweet, sometimes savory, sometimes laden with butter—typically
eaten in the afternoon with pink, salted tea, called noon chai.

Where: Kashmir or Punjab


With What: Salted tea or any old curry you like

Rumali Roti
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Made from an elastic dough that mixes atta and maida, rumali roti takes its name
from the word for “handkerchief” (rumal) in Hindi and other North Indian
languages. Rumali roti originates in the highly sophisticated, richly spiced cuisine
that emerged under the tenure of the Mughal emperors in Delhi and Agra, and
it’s still most common in the North and in Muslim neighborhoods throughout the
country. Stretched broad and thin, rumali roti is tossed almost like a pizza until
it’s translucent and wide, sometimes up to nearly two feet in diameter, then
cooked over an iron dome heated with coals. Rumali roti, like much Mughlai
cooking, is an example of the ingenuity and innovation that came out of India’s
Muslim imperial kitchens.

Where: Originally Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, now anyplace with a sizable Muslim
population
With What: Usually meat dishes, like creamy galouti kebabs, or the marrow-
studded stew nalli nihari

Paratha

Made from unleavened atta, parathas come in two primary forms (though there
are dozens of others): plain or stuffed. Plain parathas are rolled out into a circle,
folded into a triangle, and rolled again to give them densely pressed layers.
Stuffed parathas are usually made by sealing potatoes, lentils, or cauliflower
(though the options are basically limitless) between two rolled flatbreads, then
rolling the whole thing out again into a stuffed pancake. In both cases, the final
paratha is first cooked on a dry tawa to mottle the surface, then shallow fried
(preferably in ghee) and served with yogurt and pickle for a classic North Indian
breakfast.
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Where: Eaten all over North India


With What: Various, but most famously mango pickle and yogurt

Sheermal

Something like a mildly sweet naan, sheermal is made with saffron-infused milk
and cooked in the tandoor. A specialty in the city of Lucknow, sheermal first came
to India when the Mughals imported a governor and bureaucrats from Iran to
oversee the region of Awadh, which, by the early eighteenth century, had become
an extravagantly wealthy kingdom in its own right. In the bazaars of Lucknow
today, whole lanes of sheermal vendors stack orange rounds of bread around
open tandoors—a decadent utensil for the richly spiced meat curries and kebabs
for which the city is famous.

Where: Lucknow
With What: Anything meat-based with warm spices, like nihari or haleem

Chochwor

Still the subject of a horrifically violent and complex dispute between India and
Pakistan, Kashmir is where central Asia, home to some of the world’s oldest and
richest baking traditions, becomes South Asia. Bakeries (known as kandurs) are
as common in Kashmiri towns as halal carts in midtown Manhattan, their open
fronts piled with large, pale naan-like breads called lavasa; flaky,
layeredkatlams; and deeply scored girdas, which, in the mornings, are smeared
with jam or butter and eaten alongside mild saffron- and cardamom-scented tea.
But one of the most popular breads is chochwor, which resembles a soft poppy
seed bagel and is eaten in many Kashmiri households with afternoon salt chai.
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Where: Kashmir
With What: Tea

SOUTH

Dosa

Golden, crepe-like dosas made from fermented rice-and-lentil batters are one of
relatively few Indian dishes outside of the popular standbys of North India to gain
popularity in the United States. Often stuffed with spiced potatoes (or, in Mumbai,
any number of oddities, first among them vile “Sichuan” noodles), dosas read
more as bread than as a snack, which is how they’re often eaten. But in their
other variants—rava dosa, made from semolina and riddled with holes like a slice
of swiss cheese; fluffy ulundu dosa, made from urad dal; and lacy pesarattu,
made from mung beans—dosas serve the same role as a roti, doubling as starch
and utensil to be used with fish or vegetable curries or with various chutneys for
breakfast.

Where: Originally from the South, now available everywhere


With What: Coconut chutney and sambar, a South Indian lentil dish

Neer Dosa

While it’s technically another variety of dosa, neer dosa is singular enough in
texture and flavor to warrant its own entry. Neer dosa originates in the region of
Tulu Nadu, a narrow stretch of India’s southwestern coast between Kerala and
Goa that produces fine seafood and vegetarian cooking. Meaning “water dosa” in
the local Tulu language, neer dosa is made from a thin, unfermented rice batter
cooked lightly on a tawa. It comes out white, gauzy, and slightly stretchy, like
cheong fun without the chew.
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Where: Mangalore
With What: Anything you like, but best with seafood

Mangalore Buns

Another dish from Tulu country, these sweet buns are named for the coastal city
of Mangalore in the modern-day state of Karnataka. Like naan and sheermal in
the North—and really any wheat-based bread in the South—they are the result
of outside influence. A major trading post for millennia, Mangalore has been under
the control of the Buddhist Mauryas of North India, many of the major Hindu
dynasties that rose and fell in Southern India, the Muslim Sultans of Mysore, and
the Catholic Portuguese (regional competition from Dutch trading posts down the
coast also left their mark on the region), resulting in some of the finest, most
varied food in South India. The dough consists of refined wheat flour kneaded
with ripe bananas and yogurt (and sometimes some cumin seeds); it’s left
overnight to rise, then deep-fried in the morning. Steam-filled and fluffy and mildly
sweet, Mangalore buns—particularly when eaten with coconut chutney and a cup
of milky-sweet South Indian coffee—are among the heartiest breakfasts the
subcontinent has to offer.

Where: Mangalore
With What: Coconut chutney and sweet coffee

Appams

Bowl-shaped appams are made from a fermented rice batter lightly sweetened
with a pinch of sugar. Cooked in a concave pan called anappachatti, the batter
forms crisp, lacy upper edges and pools in the center to form a thick, pillowy
mound. Most often associated with the southwestern state of Kerala, appams are
also popular across the hills in Tamil Nadu and south in Sri Lanka, where they’re
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Anglicized as “hoppers” and often served for breakfast with an egg cracked in the
center. There are at least a half dozen variations popular among different
communities in the region, including kallappam, which uses toddy, or coconut
palm wine, as a fermenting agent, and palappam, made with thick coconut milk,
which makes the center softer and sweeter.

Where: Kerala
With What: For breakfast, eat with vegetable ishtu (stew) or fiery egg curry

Idiyappam

Most common in Sri Lanka, though eaten in South India, too, “string hoppers” (as
they’re usually Anglicized) are made with a simple batter of rice or millet flour and
water, which is then pressed into fine noodles and steamed as cakes roughly the
size of potato latkes. Usually eaten at breakfast with mildly spiced curries, string
hoppers are only bread in the most liberal sense of the word, but they’re delicious
and very much a part of the appam family.

Where: Sri Lanka


With What: Best with mild breakfast curries made with turmeric-stained coconut
milk

Malabar Parotta

The Southern iteration of the paratha bears a slight resemblance to its North
Indian namesake, aside from its richness and its use of maida, likely introduced
through the Muslim community in the state’s northern reaches. The dough,
typically made with maida and ghee and sometimes an egg, gets worked over a
flat surface into a thin sheet, then pleated, rolled into spirals, and griddled in more
Page |8

ghee. The result is an enormous buttery mess: delicately feathered, flaky, crisp,
and soft.

Where: Kerala
With What: Absolutely everything

Neypathal

Another Keralite bread, neypathal is made from an unfermented rice batter


flavored with coconut and fennel then deep-fried. It’s eaten either with tea and
fruit for breakfast, or as a flatbread/utensil with any number of curries at lunch or
dinner.

Where: Kerala
With What: Fruit and tea for breakfast, curries for lunch or dinner

EAST

Luchi

The classic bread of Bengal and other adjacent states in eastern India, a luchi is
more or less the same as a traditional deep-fried puri, though it’s made with
refined flour and ghee rather than whole wheat and oil, making for a lighter,
stretchier bread.

Where: Bengal
With What: Great for thick, mustardy Bengali curries

Litti

A staple dish in the state of Bihar (and similar in appearance tobaati, made in the
state of Rajasthan), litti are dense, dry balls ofcarom-spiked atta stuffed with a
Page |9

mixture of spiced chickpea flour, usually flavored with some combination of


cumin, carom, onion seed, cilantro, chilies, and ginger. Formed into fist-sized
balls and roasted in ghee, litti are almost always served with a mashed vegetable,
called chokha.

Where: Bihar
With What: Mashed vegetable dishes, called chokha (a favorite: charred
eggplant mashed with yogurt, mustard oil, cilantro, and chili)

Pitha

A common term for a variety of small, shaped breads made throughout the
eastern states of Assam, Odisha, and Bengal, pithascan be sweet or savory, rice-
or wheat-based, stuffed or solid, fried or baked or steamed. Savory pithas are
stuffed with cooked and mashed vegetables like potato or cauliflower, while sweet
pithas typically involve coconut, cane sugar, dates, or nuts. In most households
in the region, pithas are a special-occasion dish, made for festivals and life-cycle
events, while in Assam the term is applied pretty broadly to most dishes
resembling breads, including a variation made from rice batter steamed in
bamboo.

Where: Orissa, Assam, Bengal


With What: On their own

Putharo

The Khasi tribes in the hill state of Meghalaya, just north of Bangladesh, prepare
foods virtually unrelated to what you’ll find elsewhere in India, with a heavy
emphasis on pork, bamboo, and fermented beans or river fish, served with
heaping mounds of rice. One of the only bread-like items traditionally prepared
P a g e | 10

among the Khasis is putharo, a glutinous pancake made from ground red sticky
rice that’s wrapped in leaves (usually banana), steamed, and served hot with red
tea at small shacks on damp hillside roads.

Where: Meghalaya
With What: In the morning with red tea

Tal Angangaba

Translating roughly to “red bread,” this sweet fried bread is a specialty of the
Meitei community in the far eastern state of Manipur, which occupies a valley
along the border with Burma. Made from maida, jaggery, and fennel, tal angangba
is served for a Meitei Hindu ceremony called Shorat, performed on the thirteenth
day after a loved one’s death.

Where: Manipur
With What: Nothing

WEST

Vade

A specialty of the Konkan Coast, the western coastal region between Mumbai
and Goa, deep-fried vade (not to be confused with vada, a snack made from
deep-fried fermented rice batter in the South, orsabudana vada, made from
tapioca) are made from a batter of rice, lentils, and a variety of finely ground
spices, often a combination of coriander, cumin, fenugreek, and pepper. Since
coriander and fenugreek both act as thickeners, unleavened vade come out of
the fryer puffed and hollow like puris. Vade are most often served with a spicy,
coconut-based chicken curry as part of a dish called kombdi vade (best eaten at
a street cart of the same name in Mumbai).
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Where: Konkan Coast (coastal Maharashtra, Goa, and Karnataka)


With What: Versatile, but ideal with fiery fish curries

Puran Poli

A sweet flatbread from the western states of Maharashtra and Gujarat, puran poli
is typically served as part of the festivities surrounding holidays like Ganesh
Chaturthi (the ten-day festival of the elephant-headed god that brings Mumbai to
a virtual standstill each year). Made from a thinly rolled wheat-flour dough, puran
poli is stuffed with a sweet mixture of lentils and unrefined cane sugar, then
cooked in ghee on the tawa. Similar dishes known as boli, holige, and obbattu
can be found in India’s southern states.

Where: Maharashtra and Gujarat


With What: Usually on its own; in the far South, served with payasam, a thin rice
pudding

Thepla

A crisp but pliable flatbread from the arid, largely vegetarian region of Gujarat,
theplas are typically made by combining atta with yogurt, a bit of turmeric, and, in
the most flavorful iteration, chopped fenugreek leaves (methi), though plain
theplas are common as well. Rolled flat, then cooked on the tawa with a small
pour of oil, methi theplas are bitter and aromatic, delicious with yogurt or mango
pickle, and a staple bread in most Gujarati households.

Where: Gujarat
With What: They travel well with pickles, or are great with vegetable curries at
lunch

Thalipeeth
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Not unlike a thepla in texture, Maharashtrian thalipeeth is a crisp-edged, pan-fried


flatbread made from a combination of grains that usually includes whole wheat,
millet, and chickpea flours and sometimes also sorghum and rice. Chopped
cilantro, curry leaves, onion, tomato, turmeric, cumin, and chilies are mixed in for
flavor before rolling out the dough out (usually with a little hole in the center) and
frying it on the tawa with a bit of oil. A variation on this combines tapioca and
amaranth flours for a lighter, paler bread.

Where: Maharashtra
With What: Ghee or yogurt

Koki

These twice-roasted atta rotis from Sindh, a desert region in modern-day Pakistan
just northwest of Gujarat, are flavored with dried and ground pomegranate seed
(a killer souring agent), coriander, cumin, and chilies (also sometimes asafetida
and turmeric, depending on who’s making them). Once the unleavened dough is
mixed, it’s rolled out, then dry-roasted briefly on the tawa before being broken,
reformed into a ball, rolled out, and roasted a second time, yielding a thick, flaky
flatbread.

Where: Sindh (western Gujarat/southeastern Pakistan)


With What: Ideally with lime pickle and yogurt

Bhakri

Common in one form or another throughout Western and Central India, bhakri
can be made from any number of grains, particularly wheat, sorghum, millet, and,
along the Konkan Coast, rice. More a generic name for a group of breads than a
singular style, bhakris can vary pretty widely from place to place, depending on
P a g e | 13

the grain used and thickness, but they tend to be coarser, thicker, and more
flavorful than their closest relative, the ubiquitous roti.

Where: West and Central India, but especially Maharashtra and Gujarat
With What: Any type of curry, vegetable fry, or dal

Pav

Pav is the Mumbai iteration of the Portuguese word pão, introduced by traders
and missionaries in the early colonial period. Because yeast was hard to come
by at the time, early recipes for pav used toddy as a fermenting agent, though
most modern recipes for these soft, spongy buns call for shelf-stable yeast. On
any street in Mumbai, you’ll find them split and stuffed with omelets, toasted and
served with pav bhaji (a mess of smashed vegetables cooked down with
outrageous quantities of butter), or, in Muslim neighborhoods, served with
kheema (spiced minced mutton). The most iconic snack of the city combines pav
with a Maharashtrian dish called batata vada—a deep-fried battered ball of spiced
smashed potatoes—for a carb-on-carb punch to the gut that is, sort of ironically,
both a populist symbol for the conservative, regionalist ruling party, and, in its
actual multi-culti origins, a powerful symbol, like bread itself, of how unstable the
idea of “tradition” truly is.

Where: Mumbai and Goa


With What: Great with minced mutton, deep-fried vegetables (pav bhaji), and,
most famously, batata vada

[Courtesy Source : A GUIDE TO THE BREADS OF INDIA. December 7, 2016


– Lucky Peach.]
P a g e | 14

Indian breads are a wide variety of flatbreads and crêpes which are an integral
part of Indian cuisine. Their variation reflects the diversity of Indian culture, food
habits and geography. The staple and most simple Indian bread is the Roti.

The staple and most simple Indian bread is the Roti. Most Indian breads are
flatbreads that are made from wheat flours such as Atta flour and Maida flour
except in the south where Rice Flour is used since rice is the staple food there.

Naan or khamiri is from North India


P a g e | 15

Traditional Style – Indian Bread Maker

This is a list of Indian breads. Indian breads are a wide variety of flatbreads
and crêpes which are an integral part of Indian cuisine. Their variation reflects the
diversity of Indian culture, food habits and geography. The staple and most simple
Indian bread is the Roti. Most Indian breads are flatbreads that are made from
wheat flours such as Atta flour and Maida flour except in the south where Rice
Flour is used since rice is the staple food there.
P a g e | 16

Indian breads

Chapatis

Bhatoora.
P a g e | 17

Puran Poli is a traditional type of sweet flatbread

Kulcha
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Luchi is a deep fried flat bread

Parotta is a layered flat bread


P a g e | 19

A stack of pathiri – pancakes prepared with rice flour

Pesarattu is prepared with batter of green gram (moong dal)

 Appam – type of South Indian pancake made with fermented rice batter
and coconut milk
 Bakshalu – made of maida, chanadal, sugar/jaggery, from the cuisine of
Telangana, specially prepared for the Ugadi (Telugu New Year) festival
P a g e | 20

 Baati – hard, unleavened bread cooked in the desert areas of Rajasthan, and
in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh
 Bhakri – round flat unleavened bread often used in the cuisine of the state
of Maharashtra in India but is also common in western and central India,
especially in the states of Rajasthan, Gujarat, Malwa, Goa, and
northern Karnataka.
 Bhatoora – fluffy deep-fried leavened bread from North India
 Chapati – unleavened flatbread (also known as roti) from India, Nepal,
Bangladesh and Pakistan which is baked on a hot surface. It is a
common staple food in India
 Cheela – crepes made from batter of varying ingredients in North India -
ingredients usually include pulse (dal) flour, wheat flour and sometimes finely
chopped vegetables.
 Chikkolee – spicy wheat dish common in southern Andhra Pradesh and parts
of Maharashtra.
 Chili parotha – essentially a plain paratha shredded into small, bite-sized
pieces mixed with sauteed onions, tomatoes, and chili powder
 Daal Puri – fried flatbread from Bengal where the dough is filled with cooked
& spiced Cholar Dal (Bengal Gram lentil). Popular as a breakfast food.
 Dhebra – made with pearl millet (bajra) flour, often flavoured
with fenugreek leaf (methi)
 Dosa – fermented crêpe or pancake made from rice batter and black lentils. It
is a staple dish in South Indian states of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra
Pradesh and Kerala.
 Masala dosa – dosa stuffed with fried potato,spices and onions
 Benne dose – type of dosa which traces its origin from the city
of Davangere in Karnataka
P a g e | 21

 Rava dosa – crêpe of South India


 Neer dosa – crêpe prepared from rice batter. It is light type of dosa.
 Idli – rice and fermented black lentil batter that is steamed
 Kachori – unleavened deep-fried bread with lentils filling
 Khakhra – thin crackers made from mat bean, wheat flour and oil
 Kulcha – leavened bread eaten in India and Pakistan, made from maida
flour (wheat flour)
 Luchi – deep-fried flatbread from Bengal similar to Puri but made with maida
flour instead of atta.
 Naan – oven-baked leavened flatbread
 Papadum – thin, crisp disc-shaped Indian food typically based on
a seasoned dough made from black gram (urad flour), fried or cooked with dry
heat
 Paratha – layered or stuffed flatbread from North India - traditionally made
from whole wheat flour by baking with oil on a hot surface.
 Aloo paratha
 Gobhi paratha
 Laccha paratha
 Parotta – layered flat bread of Kerala and some parts of Southern India,
notably in Tamil Nadu made from maida flour
 Pashti – flatbread prepared with rice flour and pan fried in ghee
 Pathiri – pancake made of rice flour
 Pesaha Appam – unleavened Passover bread made by the Saint Thomas
Christians (also known as Syrian Christians or Nasrani) of Kerala, Indiato be
served on Passover night.
 Pesarattu – crepe-like bread that is similar to dosa, made out of mung dal.
 Phulka – see chapati
P a g e | 22

 Pitha/Pithe – type of cake, dim sum or bread common in Bengal, Assam and
Orissa.
 Til Pitha – dry powdered rice cakes with Sesame seeds and Jaggery
filling Assam
 Puli Pithe – from Bengal
 Patishapta – from Bengal
 Chitoi Pithe – from Bengal
 Narikol Pitha – dry powdered rice cakes with grated and sweetened
coconut filling Assam
 Manda Pitha – steamed Pitha Orissa
 Kakara Pitha – Orissa
 Puran Poli – traditional type of sweet flatbread
 Puri – unleavened deep-fried bread
 Radhaballabhi fried flatbread similar to Dalpuri but the filling consists of Urad
Dal [Black Lentils] instead of Cholar Dal.
 Ragi dosa – dosa made out of finger millet.
 Roti – most simple and most common of all Indian breads.
 Akki rotti
 Jolada rotti
 Makki di roti
 Ragi rotti – made of ragi (finger millet) flour
 Rumali Roti
 Sheermal – saffron-flavored flatbread
 Taftan – leavened bread from Uttar Pradesh
 Tandoori Roti – baked in a clay oven called a tandoor. Thicker than a normal
Roti.
 Thalipeeth – savoury multi-grain pancake popular in Western India
P a g e | 23

 Utthapam – dosa-like dish made by cooking ingredients in a batter


 Sanna – spongy rice cake available at Coastal Karnataka and Goa, made from
fermented or unfermented Rice batter with or without sweeteners
 Kori Rotti – crisp dry wafers (about 1mm thick) made from boiled rice and
served along with spicy Chicken curry. Usually available in A4 size packs and
very popular bread in Coastal Karnataka.

Indian breads are a wide variety of flatbreads and crêpes which are an integral
part of Indian cuisine. Their variation reflects the diversity of Indian culture and
food habits.

Ingredients :

Most flat breads from northern India are unleavened and made primarily from
milled flour, usually atta or maida, and water. Some flatbreads,
especially paratha, may be stuffed with vegetables and layered with
either ghee or butter.

In Maharashtra and Karnataka breads are also made from grains like jowar
(Sorghum bicolor), ragi, a finger millet (scientific name: Eleuisine Coracana) and
bajra or pearl millet, and is called "rotla" in Gujarat and "bhakri" in Maharashtra.

In southern India and the West Coast, most flat breads are basically crêpes made
from peeled and split black lentils (urad dal) and rice. Popular varieties
include dosa, Appam, uttapam and rice rotis and ragi rotis.

Most Indian breads make use of the yeast spores in the atmosphere for
fermentation.

Preparation
P a g e | 24

In northern India, a dough of the main ingredient is prepared and flattened by


rolling. Most Indian breads, such as roti, kulcha and chapati, are baked on tava,
a griddle made from cast iron, steel or aluminum. Others such
as puri and bhatura are deep-fried. The dough for these breads is usually made
with less water in order to reduce oil soaked up when frying.

In Southern India, a batter of rice and black lentils is prepared and ladled in small
amounts onto a hot greased skillet, where it is spread out into a thin circle and
fried with oil or ghee until golden brown. In Western India (including the states of
Maharashtra, Gujarat and Rajasthan) bread may be made from coarse grains
such as bajra, sorghum or ragi, though wheat is the staple in these regions. The
grains and/or cereals are usually milled into a fine powder, and mixed with a little
water to make a smooth dough. This dough is patted into a circle by hand - either
by holding it between the two hands or by placing it on an upturned plate or other
flat surface.

In Maharashtra a multi-grain flat-bread called "thalipeeth" is also prepared. It


contains many grains and cereals like wheat, rice, bajra, jowar, ragi,
Macrotyloma_uniflorum horsegram, green gram, black gram, chickpeas and so
on. Each grain or cereal is roasted separately and then milled together into a fine
powder. Spices and chopped onions are added along with water to make the
dough, and it is patted into circles, after which it is roasted on a griddle with some
ghee or oil. It is often served with home made butter.

Indian breads of Central Asian origin, such as naan and tandoori roti, are baked
in a tandoor. Naan is usually leavened with yeast.

Varieties

Different varieties of Indian bread include: Chapati, Phulka, Puri, Roti, Bajra
Rotla,Thepla, Paratha, Naan, Kulcha, Bhatoora, Baqar
P a g e | 25

Khani, Appam, Dosa, Luchi, Puran Poli, Pathiri, Parotta and many more. Some
of these, like Paratha and Roti have many varieties. Some varieties depend on
the kind of grain used to prepare them, and others depend on the fillings they
contain.

The Appam is a fermented crepe usually prepared with finely powdered rice flour.
In the South Indian state of Kerala, many varieties are made
like Kallappam, Vattayappam and Palappam (Vellayappam). The kallappam is
made on flat iron griddles. The vattayappam is a steamed bread, and palappam
is made in small shallow bottomed pans, which are kept covered while the bread
cooks. Palappam has a thin crisp lace like strip around it.

Bhatura
P a g e | 26

Chapati/Roti

Dosa
P a g e | 27

Luchi

Parotta
P a g e | 28

Kulchas with choley'

Naan
P a g e | 29

Papadum

Paratha
P a g e | 30

Puri

Jolada rotti
P a g e | 31

Pathiri

Puran Poli
P a g e | 32

Rumali Roti

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[Collected from the open sources of electronic media for the sole purpose of educating
IHM students - Courtesy and thankfulness for textual information to ‘Internet’ and
images to ‘You Tube’].

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