How to Make Roti

Ingredients

• 200g Plain flour - Traditional Indian roti are made using atta flour, if you can find this locally, you can also use wholemeal wheat flour or bread flour. But we get great results using plain flour, just make sure you spend the time to knead it well.
• 1 tablespoon oil - canola or vegetable oil.
• Pinch of salt
• 150 ml boiling water

Instructions

Make the dough.

Start by adding all the ingredients into a bowl, using a knife to mix it well. Being careful the dough is not too hot place it onto a clean surface. Knead for 10-15 minutes, until the dough it smooth and soft. You shouldn't need to flour the surface, but lightly do so if your dough is sticking. Place the dough in a bowl, cover with plastic wrap and rest for 20 minutes.

Divide the dough into 8 smooth balls. To smooth the balls roll on the surface using a cupped hand. Watch the video below for this technique.

Place the dough balls back in the bowl and cover to prevent from drying out.

How to roll out the roti.

Place a nonstick frying pan, tawa or cast iron pan on a medium/ high heat. While the pan is heating, take one ball out and flatten slightly. Dip the flattened ball into flour making sure both sides are lightly covered, helping you to create smooth circles when rolling them out. And lightly flour the surface.

Roll the dough out into a circle, making it as thin as you can, aiming for 2 mm. It helps to roll around the edges, moving the dough round as you work. Don't worry about perfect, this is a technique that takes practice, when you start out just focus on making them as thin as you can.

How to cook the roti.

Place the roti on the hot pan. Leave it on one side for 10 secs, to slightly colour. Then turn the roti over on to the other side, leaving it till its cooked through. This will take between 30-60 seconds, depending on how thin you rolled the roti. While this one is cooking, roll out the next dough ball into a circle.

Once the roti is cooked through, turn it over for the final time to further colour the first side.

Pro Tip!

Three cooks is important! It is during the third cooking time that the perfect roti, will puff up. How much depends on how thin you rolled out the dough. Either way they will taste great, so whether you get a few bubbles or the entire roti pillows up, let it cook for a further 10-20 seconds before removing from the pan. Watch it closely at this stage, to prevent it from burning. Place the cooked roti on a plate, between a clean towel, while you repeat the process until all your roti are cooked.

Once you get into the flow of making roti, it can be quite a therapeutic process. Happy rolling!

Serving suggestions

Once you have mastered how to make soft roti, it's a great dish to whip up along side many curries. Perfect with a Fijian chicken curry, South Indian fish curry or Chicken and spinach saagwala curry.