Naan with Garlic Butter and Coriander

There are nights when a curry is only ever an excuse for the naan. I will happily admit it. The dish in the bowl is lovely, but the thing I actually want is a piece of blistered, garlicky flatbread, hot enough to almost burn my fingers, dragged through whatever sauce is going. For years I assumed proper naan needed a tandoor and a special hand, and I bought packets that went leathery before they reached the table. Then I learned that a screaming-hot frying pan and a bit of yoghurt get you ninety percent of the way there, and I have not bought a packet since.

1 What makes a naan a naan

Naan is a leavened flatbread from across the Indian subcontinent and beyond, traditionally slapped onto the searing wall of a clay tandoor where it puffs and chars in under a minute. The leavening and the enrichment are what set it apart from a plain chapati. Yoghurt is the heart of it: it brings a gentle tang, tenderises the dough, and helps create that soft, pillowy chew. A little yeast and a pinch of baking powder give the puff and the characteristic bubbles that scorch and blister.

You cannot easily build a tandoor in a normal kitchen, but you can fake the conditions. A heavy cast-iron pan, or any thick frying pan, heated until it is genuinely fierce, mimics that fast, intense heat. The naan goes in dry, bubbles up dramatically, and takes on those lovely black-brown spots in a minute or two a side. It is honestly one of the most satisfying things to cook on a normal weeknight.

2 The twist: garlic butter, finished hot

Garlic naan is hardly a new idea, but the way most recipes handle the garlic is a missed opportunity. They knead it raw into the dough, where it cooks out to almost nothing. I do the opposite. I make a quick garlic butter, melting butter gently with a great deal of finely grated garlic, just long enough to take the raw edge off but keep all the fragrant punch, then brush it over the naan the moment they come off the heat.

This is the move. Hot bread drinks up that butter, the garlic perfumes the whole kitchen, and because it never sat over high heat it stays sweet and aromatic rather than bitter. I hold strong opinions about garlic generally, and this is one of them: garlic added at the end keeps its soul. Four fat cloves for six breads is not a typo. Trust me, or rather, trust the garlic. Fresh coriander stirred into the butter and scattered over the top adds a clean, herby lift that cuts through all that richness.

3 Getting the dough right

The dough should be soft and a touch tacky, not stiff. A wetter dough makes a more tender naan, so resist the urge to keep adding flour while kneading. Let it prove until properly doubled, then divide and let the balls rest before rolling, which relaxes the gluten so they roll out and stay rolled out instead of shrinking back.

Roll them unevenly on purpose, a little thicker in patches, so you get a mix of crisp thin bits and soft puffy bits. The classic teardrop shape comes from gently stretching one end as you transfer the dough, though a rough oval is perfectly authentic too. Make sure your pan is hot before the first one goes in. The first naan is often the sacrificial test piece while the pan finds its temperature, and that is fine; consider it the cook’s perk.

4 Serving and keeping warm

The enemy of homemade naan is the gap between the pan and the plate, where it cools and stiffens. Brush each one with garlic butter the instant it is done and stack them under a clean tea towel, which steams them gently and keeps them soft and pliable while you finish the batch.

They are made for scooping up dal, curry, or a simple bowl of yoghurt and pickle, but I will not pretend I have not eaten one folded around nothing but more garlic butter, standing at the hob. Any that survive reheat well, wrapped in foil in a hot oven or flashed back over the pan. Make extra. There is no such thing as too much garlic naan, only naan you have not eaten yet.