Bhatura

The dough is soured and fermented overnight with yogurt, so it is a sourdough rather than a quick bread.

Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains dairy (yogurt).

Ingredients

• 400 g maida
• 150 g plain live yogurt
• 60 g fine semolina
• 120 ml water
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 2 tablespoons oil
• oil for deep frying

Method

1. THE DOUGH IS SOURED AND FERMENTED OVERNIGHT WITH YOGURT, SO IT IS A SOURDOUGH RATHER THAN A QUICK BREAD. Its article is unusually precise about the microbiology: the dough is kneaded, SOURED and FERMENTED OVERNIGHT, and the lactic acid in the yogurt results in a sourdough fermentation. That makes it the only Indian bread here with a day's lead time, and it tastes of it -- there is a distinct tang that no yeasted or unleavened bread here has. Leavened with bicarbonate instead, which its article allows, you get the puff and none of the sour.
2. THE YOGURT MUST BE LIVE OR THERE IS NO FERMENTATION. A pasteurised set yogurt contributes acidity and nothing else, and the dough will not rise.
3. IT IS LEFT EIGHT HOURS SOMEWHERE WARM, COVERED. It will swell noticeably and smell sour and faintly beery. That smell is the test that it has worked.
4. SEMOLINA IS IN IT AND IT IS WHAT GIVES THE CHEW. Its article names maida and sometimes semolina. Sixty grams to four hundred -- enough to feel.
5. IT IS ROLLED THICKER THAN A PURI AND IT IS BIGGER. Three or four millimetres, twenty centimetres across. It is meant to be substantial; a thin bhatura is a puri with a sour taste.
6. THE OIL IS AT 190C AND IT IS PUSHED UNDER TO START. Same as the deep-fried breads here: held below the surface for the first few seconds so it inflates rather than floating flat.
7. IT IS FRIED TO A DEEPER COLOUR THAN A LUCHI. Golden brown with darker blisters, about ninety seconds turning once. The fermentation gives it sugars that colour readily.
8. IT IS EATEN WITH CHICKPEA CURRY AND THAT PAIRING HAS ITS OWN NAME. Chole bhature is the name of that plate, and its article has this bread as a breakfast bread above all.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

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