Thursday 7 March 2013

Roomali roti/Trinidadian Dosti roti

The Roomali/rumali roti is yet another flat bread recipe. It is incredibly thin, yet, soft roti and literally translates to handkerchief bread. It is very popular bread in the North of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and the Caribbean (including Trinidad). In Trinidad it is called dosti roti which translates to friendship bread. Like all their flat breads Trinidadians make this roti as well using plain/all purpose flour. In the Indian subcontinent these bread are made with a combination of wholemeal and refined wheat flours. Since refined flour has more gluten than wholemeal flour it is used in this bread to help stretch the bread as thin as possible and still maintain it's softness. The proportion of wholemeal to refined flour used depends on the region and varies from household to household. This roti is bound to be popular with the entire family since it is soft and thin and just melts in your mouth. You may need a large skillet/tawa or you can even cook them the traditional way on the inverted Indian griddle (kadai). The recipe instruction given here makes 10 big rotis. But you can divide the dough to make 16-20 medium/small sized rotis using regular skillet.

You will need:
2 cups of wholemeal wheat flour/atta
1 cup plain/all purpose flour
salt to taste
water to knead into soft dough (360 ml more or less)
Cooking oil for greasing and rolling (approximately 1/4 cup)











In a large mixing bowl mix both kinds of flours with salt.


 Add water (little bit at a time) and knead into a soft pliable dough. Cover and let it rest for 20 mins.






Turn the dough onto a floured surface and divide the dough into 10 (for large size rotis) equal balls.






Roll each ball out into circles of approximately 8 inches diameter.


Smear oil on top of two of these circles, making sure that the edges are well greased. Place two circles on top of each other, making sure that the oiled surfaces are together, and press the edges to seal them together. Now there is the beautiful friendship between the rotis! :)


Roll out the stacked roti into a thin big roti (as thin as possible).



Heat a greased tawa/inverted griddle to medium-high heat.







Place the roti on the tawa carefully and cook for around 1-2 minutes.






 The roti will puff up nicely







and separate the two layers.


Turn over to the other side and cook for another 30 secs to 1 min until light golden brown.



Do not over cook the roti or have it in high heat. The roti is very thin and will cook very quickly. Over cooking will lead to stiff rotis instead of soft ones.




Slightly cool the roti and separate the layers. Each layer will be an incredibly thin roomali roti.



Serve with your favorite curry/side dish.

1 comment:



  1. wow, that looks superb, I always love your step by step recipes :)
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