Both leavened and unleavened breads – some indigenous, others introduced through the influence of historical rulers – feature in Indian cuisine.
In his A Historical Dictionary of Indian Food, KT Achaya mentions a fascinating fact: cave paintings depict the act of dough being shaped and ancient, tava-like cooking utensils made of clay and metal have been discovered at Harappan sites dating back about 2000 years. Isn’t it fascinating that the everyday phulka or chapatti we eat in India today goes back so many hundreds of years?
Roti is the generic name by which Indian breads are identified across the country as well as around the world. The forms in which it is available vary slightly, with most being made of wheat flour and some prepared from indigenous millets and gluten-free flours. The methods of cooking them also differ marginally. Some breads are stuffed, others roasted on a tava and a few baked in a tandoor or puffed directly on coal embers. The roti acquires a new format and a different name with every couple of hundred kilometres that you travel through the country. In essence, however, it remains the same. In fact, the roti in its various avatars would be a wonderful subject of research, were the task not likely to take much longer than this book’s deadline would allow!
Poli, roti, chapatti – broadly the same dough and cooking technique, but it acquires a new name every time it enters another region in the country. A Maharashtrian ghadichi poli and a North Indian ajwain paratha are made in the same way – rolled out, brushed with oil, folded twice into a triangle and rolled out again. A lachcha paratha from up north and a Kerala porotta from way down south are two sides of the same coin – one, a darker, wholewheat version, and the other, an indulgent, plain flour one. In so many ways, it is bread that helps us connect with a culture that is miles apart from our own.
Common unleavened breads in India
Roti or chapatti
The everyday staple in most parts of the country, the roti, rotla, chapatti or poli is made from a soft, whole-wheat dough that may or may not contain salt and oil and is roasted on both sides on a tava. Tandoori rotis are slightly thicker than the everyday roti or chapatti and cooked in a clay oven at very high heat. They are mostly commercially made.
Phulka
A thin version of the chapatti, the phulka is often puffed directly on a naked flame or by pressing it lightly with a kitchen towel on the tava. Paratha A North Indian, mostly Punjabi, bread, the paratha is made by roasting on a tava with a (quite indulgent) dose of oil, ghee or butter. It is also made stuffed with savoury vegetarian fillings such as mashed potatoes, cauliflower and paneer, to name a few.
Lachcha or Kerala paratha
A paratha without stuffing, the lachcha has multiple layers, achieved by brushing liberal amounts of fat that help the layers separate as the paratha gets cooked on a tava. The Kerala version is usually made of plain flour, often contains egg and is served with rich, coconut-based curries.
Poli
Poli, another name for roti/chapatti, is typical to the country’s western and southern regions. A Maharashtrian Brahmin-style poli is an everyday chapatti made of fine-milled wheat. It is prepared by folding the rolled dough into a triangle with a light dotting of oil before roasting it slowly on a hot tava to reveal its many layers. Puranpoli or holige, as it is known in Karnataka, is a version of the poli, stuffed with a sweet filling made of jaggery and cooked chana daal or Bengal gram and laced with cardamom and nutmeg. Obattu is another version of the poli, stuffed with a sweet coconut filling. Gulachi poli is a thin, short poli made in Maharashtra during the cold winter months and contains a filling of jaggery, sesame seeds, dried coconut and cardamom. This moreish bread is a delicacy that few cooks are able to master. Maanda or mandige is another form of stuffed sweet bread, filled with ghee and powdered sugar and stretched by hand – a bit like the roomali roti. This is then cooked on a large, upturned wok over a wood fire, until pink. It is stored in a folded form and eaten, crushed, with warm milk. This bread requires a great deal of dexterity and skill and is now a dying form. Some regions in Maharashtra also make purnaache maande, where the ghee and sugar filling is replaced with the chana daal and jaggery one. Ukdichi poli is an unusual, lesser-known variety made by first filling the glutinous wheat dough with a soft, bouncy steamed dough made of rice flour. The poli is then rolled out and roasted on a tava. Typical to the Konkan region, this is a traditional accompaniment to the seasonal aamras.
Bhakri
In most regions of Maharashtra and the south, a bhakri is an unleavened roti made of gluten-free flours like jowar, bajra, ragi and rice. In Gujarat, however, the bhakri is also made from a tightly bound wheat dough with a liberal amount of shortening that lends the bread its brittle and crisp texture. Makke di roti Made immensely popular by mainstream Hindi films as much as by Punjabi dhabas dotting the country’s highways, makke di roti is an unleavened bread made of local maize flour. It is a typical accompaniment to sarson da saag (mustard greens) and is always served with a liberal helping of freshly churned, unsalted butter during the cold northern winters.
Puri
If there is any one kind of bread commonly enjoyed across the country, regardless of region, it is probably the puri. An unleavened bread made of whole-wheat flour and deep-fried, it is a ubiquitous feature in all sorts of festive spreads and is also eaten at breakfast, usually paired with a simple potato curry or, sometimes, with some sort of chickpea curry. In Bengal, an all-purpose flour version called luchi is prepared and paired with alur dom, a fragrant potato curry.
Excerpted with permission from Crumbs!: Bread Stories and Recipes for the Indian Kitchen, Saee Koranne-Khandekar, Hachette India.
