For years I have enjoyed eating Paratha’s (unleavened flat breads) at festivals, weddings, and other devotee gatherings, but have never actually learned how to cook them. So this weekend I took out the Indian Cookbooks and found a nice recipe and fried some up, and offered them to the Lord. They were easy to prepare, and very delicious.
They can also be stuffed and we will explore this option in a later post.
The following recipe I found on the Internet at tarladala.com, and the images are not mine but also gathered online. Also in this post is addition information on the history of Paratha’s.
Ingredients
1 cup whole wheat flour (gehun ka atta)
salt to taste
1 tsp oil or ghee
whole wheat flour for rolling
melted ghee for brushing and cooking
Method
Combine all the ingredients in a deep bowl and knead into a semi-soft dough using enough water.
Divide the dough into 6 equal portions.
Roll each portion into a 125 mm. (5″) diameter circle, using a little whole wheat flour for rolling, brush with melted ghee, fold into half to form a semi- circle.
Brush the semi-circle with melted ghee and fold again to form a triangle.
Roll out into a 125 mm. (5″) length triangular paratha using a little whole wheat flour for rolling.
Heat a non-stick tava (griddle) and cook each paratha on both the sides, using a little ghee, till brown spots appear on both the sides.
Repeat steps 3 to 6 to make 5 more parathas.
Serve hot with fresh curds.
Additional information
A paratha/parantha/parauntha (Punjabi: پراٹھا ) is a flatbread that originated in the Indian Subcontinent. It is still quite prevalent throughout the area. Parantha is an amalgamation of the words parat and atta which literally means layers of COOKED dough.[1] In Bengali it is known as porota (পরোটা) while in Burma, it is known as palata (ပလာတာ; pronounced: [pəlàtà]), and is known as farata in Mauritius and the Maldives. However, in areas of the Punjabi region, it is REFERRED to as prontha or parontay.
It is one of the most popular unleavened flat breads in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent and is made by pan frying whole wheat dough on a tava.[2] The parantha dough usually contains ghee or cooking oil which is also layered on the freshly prepared paratha.[3] Paranthas are usually stuffed with boiled potatoes (as in aloo ka parantha), leaf vegetables, radishes, cauliflower, and/or paneer (Cottage-cheese). A parantha (especially a stuffed one) can be eaten simply with a pat of butter spread on top, with chutney, pickles, and YOGURT, or with meat or vegetable curries. Some roll the parantha into a tube and eat it with tea, often dipping the parantha.
The parantha can be round, heptagonal, square, or triangular. When it is round, the stuffing is mixed with the kneaded flour, and the parantha is prepared in the same way as roti, but in the latter two forms, the peda (ball of kneaded flour) is flattened into a CIRCLE, the stuffing is kept in the middle, and the flatbread is closed around the stuffing like an envelope. The latter two also vary in that they have discernible soft layers, with one “opening” to the crispier shell layers.
Pasted from; Wikipedia
