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Today, I'm gonna make my
favorite Indian bread, paratha.
And paratha is not just a bread,
or something that you eat,
it is an emotion.
This for me symbolizes
my entire childhood.
It also symbolizes the city.
For those who don't
know Bengali literature,
go read one story, which is "Kabuliwala",
the man from Kabul.
It's a story of a
relationship and a friendship
between a young girl
and a man who used to come to sell spices
to her family home.
And, you know, she grew up, and you know,
this whole story about
this great friendship
between Kabul and Calcutta
is also about paratha.
I still cry when I read that story,
because it is a sense of loss,
and this bread, you know,
whenever I think of
home, it is this bread.
Now that I'm not actually
breaking it into tears,
let me explain what paratha is.
A lot of people think that, you know,
in Indian homes we eat naan
and things, and we don't,
we eat parathas, it is made
on a tawa, it's a flat bread,
it's very easy to make in large numbers,
for large numbers of people,
you can fry two or three at the same time.
This is advantage,
and one thing we don't
have in India is an oven.
There's no idea of baking bread.
We don't have this whole
concept of baked bread.
Our bread is always made on fire,
because that's how, you know, we cook.
We cook on fire, we don't cook on ovens
and we don't have this tradition.
So, paratha is very soft.
There are many different
versions of paratha.
You can stuff it, you can add
other things to the dough.
What I'm actually showing you
is a very classic paratha.
You can then go ahead, you
know, and be adventurous
and add bits and pieces
to it, chopped chillies,
garlic, pepper, do whatever you want,
but I'm showing you how to make
the essential core paratha.
This is a paratha
that you would find the
Kabuliwalas having in Calcutta.
This is a paratha we grew up.
What is very important to also point out,
this flour is maida,
which is Indian flour.
So if you obviously cannot get maida,
what you should do is use plain flour.
Do not use bread flour.
Strong flour, bread flour,
these are the flours to avoid.
Use the simplest, plain flour.
That'll actually give you a soft paratha
because the problem is that Western wheat
has got too much gluten in it.
Very, very simple ingredients.
The flour that I've talked about.
The ghee. The ghee can
be replaced with oil
if you wanna make it vegan.
The reason why I'm adding ghee
is I am not gonna waste my
chance and not have more ghee.
This is what I miss from
home, so too bad, how sad.
You can add oil, it's not a problem.
There's sugar.
And this is again, gives
away the Calcutta connection,
because we all like a touch of sugar.
Bengalis are notorious
for having a sweet tooth.
Little bit of baking powder, salt,
and then water. That's it.
So, you're gonna mix all of this.
I start off with putting
the flour into the bowl.
The flour has been sifted.
If you haven't sifted
the flour, please do.
It brings some air in,
and it's quite important
to sift the flour.
So I'm gonna now add the baking powder,
sugar,
salt.
Just gonna mix it.
And then the fun part, which is the ghee.
I know you, it looks
like it's a lot of ghee,
but this is gonna be six parathas.
And you don't want a dry paratha,
you want paratha to have some flavor
and some kind of moisture in there,
so ghee is bringing that in.
You can use, if you don't have ghee,
and you don't wanna use
oil, you can use butter,
but the better butter to use is unsalted,
because you don't wanna add,
you've already added salt.
If you have salted butter,
cut back on the salt.
So I'm mixing this, but I'm
also making it into crumbs.
So this is a very important
because you want to incorporate the ghee,
and if you're using
oil or unsalted butter,
it's exactly the same thing.
You gotta make it look
a bit like breadcrumb.
This is an important stage
because then you know for sure
that each portion of the
paratha has the ghee.
It's this kind of crumbly,
very unique texture,
before you add the water to it,
because once you add the water,
you won't know what's happened.
So, you know, it's quite an important step
that you add the oil, the
fat, before you add the water.
Be thorough, but don't overdo it.
There are few lumps, it's not a big deal,
you don't have to worry about that.
Now I'm making a center
and that's where I'm gonna add the water.
So in the middle, I'm gonna add the water.
This is how much water I need,
but I'm saving some in the bowl,
just in case it's enough,
just in case it's enough.
So if you put too much water it, you know,
it actually can go wrong,
because then suddenly
it becomes too soggy,
and I think I'm just going
to put a bit more water,
and then that's it.
So, of course you can
knead the dough in a bowl,
but you need a bit of space,
and I always prefer, and I think
that, you know, if you can,
move it to another surface which is flat,
which allows you to actually
put some pressure on it.
So, I'm going to put
some flour on the board.
So you can't actually feel the
texture, but it's very soft,
and that comes from incorporating the ghee
or the oil in crumbs.
It's a very simple, small
tip of somehow, you know,
this is a kind of housewife things
that you'll find people doing,
and it gives it that incredible
softness all the way.
You can see, you know, in
this, if I put my finger in,
it's staying, it's not springing back.
And the thing is, if you use hard flour,
it'll spring back because of the gluten.
Knead with your knuckles. You knead it in,
and this will come with a bit
of experience, but you know,
there's that softness everywhere.
You're looking for lumps,
you're looking for bits
that haven't actually
incorporated everything in it.
Also, I think that if you are making dough
for a lot of people, use a dough tool.
It's very hard to put
this kind of pressure
and knead dough for, like, 50 parathas.
So if you're doing a small
amount, do it by hand,
and I would say if you are
new to making parathas,
start with a small amount,
so you know exactly how
the texture will feel.
So the hardness is right,
but what I want you to look
for is this kind of smoothness.
It has to be this kind of smoothness.
You know you're in bit of trouble
when you're making a Paratha and you knead
and it pushes back and it pushes back.
You don't wanna have a wrestling match
with your dough, okay?
The dough should just be pliable and soft.
So now this is ready because
if I push my finger in,
it stays. It's very soft,
it has got no hard bits,
it's not crumbly,
nothing is falling apart,
it's all holding it together.
So you know that it's ready,
so I'm gonna put it in there.
Put a damp cloth. Not soaking wet, please,
you don't want to give it a shower.
So you just keep that damp cloth in there
just to make sure that it
doesn't actually dry out,
and do not go and put
this on top of a radiator
or near the sunshine, okay?
'Cause it defeats the purpose.
You wanna keep it a little bit damp.
Don't be upset when you open that cloth
and it looks the same size.
Flour is gonna look exactly the same,
the dough's gonna look the like the same.
Give it half an hour, let it
rest before you roll it out.
(upbeat sitar music)
So the paratha has rested,
and it's hard to kind of
visually see the difference.
You'll feel the difference.
It just very, very soft
now, very easy to roll,
and the way that I've watched my mother
portion out the parathas
is to make a little tube,
that's exactly what I'm doing.
I think there are gonna be
around six portions in this.
So I'm just going to put it out
and it's a lot easier to do
the paratha sitting down,
so I'm gonna sit down.
That allows me to actually also be closer.
(upbeat sitar music)
So now I'm gonna divide it.
The easiest way to do this is
to, don't cut it all the way
in case you don't get it right first time,
you know, I divide into half
and then one, two, three,
one, two three, and now I can cut it.
So that's one.
Two.
(upbeat sitar music)
(relaxing flute music)
I'm going to show you how to roll paratha
in two different ways.
I'm gonna start off with what
is traditionally considered,
you know, lachay dar paratha,
or paratha with folds.
Laccha means folds.
So I'm greasing the base.
(relaxing flute music)
And then I start rolling it.
Just use this, whatever you
made the dough with, you know,
don't have to change it to ghee or oil,
just need a little bit of it.
So I'm not too harsh with myself
because it's not completely round,
because I'm actually making
it into another shape.
So, take a knife, a sharp knife.
Cut through half, and
then you start rolling.
Very, very gently, you
start rolling it round.
You want it to be a tight,
see, you can see how tight I'm making it.
If you make it loose and
flappy, you're not gonna have
a very tight paratha,
which you want to have.
So I'm rolling it carefully,
trying to make sure
I keep tucking it in.
I keep tucking it in to make
sure that it doesn't open up.
So, now it looks like a cone,
and then there's obviously
a pointy bit and a flat bit.
You put the flat bit down,
and then you squeeze it.
So, now this one's gonna
roll out to be a round.
At this point, it's become tight.
You don't wanna do mess around with it.
So basically I'm going
to put it down here,
and then cover it with a damp cloth,
and I'll have to leave it for a while.
(playful flute music)
So this is the second
way to make the paratha.
In my family, this is
called a chaar corner,
which is four corners.
This is like the absolutely
standard paratha on a Sunday.
It's really actually quite a nice way
to get your kids to help you.
It's a little bit simpler,
but also I think quite
interesting, not too messy,
and I think kids should
learn to make their bread,
and then they'll eat it.
So, you roll this out, and
then you take a bit of ghee,
and it's not like, you know, tons of ghee,
you're just gonna layer it a bit.
So it's like putting
butter on bread, okay?
You're not gonna drown it.
Then you sprinkle a bit of plain flour.
You've got to kind of make sure
that the flour goes everywhere,
otherwise this is gonna be
quite hard to roll later on.
Then you take one flap
that way.
Another flap.
You're trying to get to a square.
(energetic drum music)
You fold it together.
Just kind of try and compact it.
This is in the hope that
it's gonna turn out square.
It doesn't always work,
but I try and kind of shape
it, and then when I roll it
it's kind of slightly
not completely square.
(upbeat drum music)
And then, you know, you leave
it to rest for half an hour.
(relaxing flute music)
So, now that the paratha has
been curled up and rested,
you don't want to add more ghee to it
because otherwise it's
gonna become too soft,
it's already now firm.
So, this is when you actually need to use
a lightly floured surface,
because you're just gonna make sure that
it doesn't get stuck.
This is something that
comes with practice.
Don't put pressure, let it roll naturally.
It'll move around,
and that's when the
perfect circle will come.
It's very tempting to put pressure on it.
Don't put pressure on it
because otherwise what's gonna happen
is it's going to actually
start opening up,
and you don't want it to open up
because there are little folds in there.
Remember the folds? That, you
know, I made at the beginning.
So you want it to have a flat surface.
This does require some
patience and some gentleness,
you've gotta be a bit gentle.
So this is around six inches diameter.
I think I'm, this is
the right kind of size.
You can make it a bit thinner if you want.
This really depends on
your kind of, you know,
do you have the confidence
to kind of make it thinner?
Because of course there's a
risk that you might tear it,
but be brave, be brave.
And you know, paratha is gonna taste nice,
irrespective of what happens.
I'm gonna show you what the square one
will come out to be
like, again, use flour.
You know, here you can
feel the ghee has come in,
it's quite soft,
and despite my best
efforts to make a square,
I have a feeling it's going to
be squareish and not square.
So this of course, different technique,
you've gotta keep turning it around.
Oh, I've done quite a good job.
It's square, it's square.
See here you can see the folds.
And you've gotta gently,
gently put a bit of pressure.
You can see the folds off there.
So just gotta be a bit
gentle around there,
so it doesn't open up.
'Cause you put pressure,
it's gonna pop up.
Just roll your hand this way,
and if you think that you're
putting too much pressure,
use two fingers!
My mother used to tell
me this, use two fingers,
because then with two fingers,
you cannot actually put a lot of pressure.
Everybody could make parathas.
(upbeat folk music)
This is the tawa, which
is a flat, cast iron pan,
and this is ideal kind of
surface on which to make paratha
because you want it to have
low, but diffused heat.
If you don't have an iron
kind of cast iron pan to use,
you can use a non-stick,
but the most important thing
is it has to be diffused heat,
because otherwise what's gonna happen
is parts of your paratha
are going to be burnt
and parts are going to be raw.
So the even heat is what is
the tawa's greatest strength.
It takes time to heat up,
it's getting there, fire is
getting more and more ferocious.
(upbeat flute music)
So, I am cooking one side.
As you can see, the pan,
one side is cooked a little
bit more than the other,
this inevitably happens,
but it happens less with the cast iron pan
and I'm squeezing it down
to make sure that it's
cooking all the way through.
So here you can see it's
cooked all the way through.
So initially it's always the case
that it cooks slightly unevenly,
and there I'm squeezing it down
to make sure that the
inside doesn't stay raw.
Just a drizzle more of ghee,
or oil, if you're using oil.
Now I have a tawa that's big enough,
so I can actually put it to the side
where it's a bit less hot,
and I can put in the other one.
Just keep an eye on this.
This is looking good.
See, this is puffing up.
It has to puff up because
that shows that actually
the heat has gone in
into all the layers and cooked through.
And a lot of people think that, you know,
paratha cook very quick,
but what can happen is your
paratha can look cooked
from outside, and be raw inside.
So, that is the sign of a
well made paratha, okay?
This you'll learn with experience,
so now I'm ready to finish it off,
and glaze it with the ghee.
I'm putting a bit of ghee
on the top, and complete it.
There, so there it gets this
kind of speckled brown look,
because what you don't want
is for the speckled brown look
to become dark brown and burnt.
You need the paratha to cook inside.
So now this one is ready to go.
I'm putting it down.
That I'm gonna move to the side.
Putting another one in,
and in actually this way,
if you have a barbecue and
you've got friends gathering,
let them do this. It's
actually really fun.
This will actually show
you why paratha is so great
for big families and
gatherings because, you know,
I could, if I wanted, have
five parathas going in one go.
So you can see it's flaky.
That's where the folds were.
So, in a home kitchen, you can
make this in a cast iron pan
or you can do it in a non stick pan.
You know, it is really
about diffused heat,
because this is what it is.
The perfect pan is the one
where no side is burnt more,
they've all heated and
they've all cooked perfectly.
The ghee goes in,
but I lift the parathas a
bit to let the ghee slide in.
See, now you can see the
ghee is getting absorbed
in the paratha.
My paratha is now ready.
About the Instructor
Asma Khan, owner of famed London eatery Darjeeling Express and bestselling cookbook author of “Asma’s Indian Kitchen” teaches her favorite family recipes, inspired by her childhood in Kolkata, India. The chef, restaurateur, and activist is the first UK-based chef to be featured on Netflix’s Emmy-nominated Chef’s Table and, in 2019, was listed number 1 on Business Insider’s ranking of "100 Coolest People in Food and Drink". Join Asma on a nostalgic culinary journey to explore the smells, flavors, and ingredients of her ancestral Bengali roots.