My guilty pleasure and go to craving is cheese naan. Making my own crispy on the outside, soft on the inside naan filled with gooey cheese made me very happy and satisfied. I hope to bring the same joy to you with this recipe adapted from a traditional Indian recipe from Honest Cooking.
Cheese naan is a type of leavened bread - funnily enough if you call it cheese naan bread you are basically saying cheese bread bread so don't make that mistake :). Believe me, this naan recipe makes it just as good as the delicious bread at the restaurants!
-
1 1/3 C warm Coconut milk, or any other milk
- 7g satchel Dry Yeast
- 4 C Plain flour
-
1/2 C Greek yoghurt, room temperature
- 1/4 C Ghee*
- 1 tsp Salt
- 2 C shredded Cheese
- 2 tbsp Butter
- Gently stir milk and yeast together in a large bowl. Let sit for 15 minutes.
- Add flour, yoghurt, ghee and salt and mix until well combined** and then mix using your hands. Drizzle oil around the bowl and cover with a clean cloth. Let rise in a warm draft free area for 2 hours or until double in size.
- Place the dough on a floured surface and knead briefly before shaping into a log. Divide the dough into 10 balls and place on the floured surface. Cover with the cloth and rest for 30 minutes.
- Flatten each ball enough to place 3-4 tablespoons of cheese inside and seal by pulling the edges and rolling into a ball again. Repeat for remaining dough balls.
- Using a rolling pin***, flatten the balls into teardrop shapes about 1/4 cm thick.
- Heat a cast iron pan over medium high heat until very hot. Cook the naan in the pan (no oil needed) and spread the butter over each naan generously as they cook. After about 2 minutes flip and cook the other side until it is browned/charred. Enjoy!
* Ghee is a healthy-fat rich indian butter which it is just found at your local grocery shop. It is the make it or break it with naan recipes (which I leant from making naan using just regular butter). If you want to have the same amazing taste and softness, ghee will be your best friend.
** It should be wet and sticky
*** Be careful when rolling out as the dough may stick. Use plenty of flour on the rolling pin and on the surface to limit this.
For the shredded cheese, I normally use 3 parts parmesan to 1 part mozzarella but the choice is yours.
You can freeze the naan for future consumption. Just reheat in the pan and it tastes just as good!
You can cook the naan in the oven too but this will make a stiffer naan.
If you made this recipe, leave a comment to let us know how you went! Add a picture of your final result or post a picture on instagram and tag me@danibianchi_.