Tandir bread

Ingredients

The dough

• 800 gstrong white bread flour
• plus extra for dusting
• 2 teaspoonsfine salt
• 7 gsachet fast-action dried yeast
• or 20 g fresh yeast
• about 500 ml warm water

Sometimes added

• 1 teaspoonsugar
• 2 tablespoonsmild vegetable oil
• 3 tablespoonsplain yoghurt
• a handful of wholemeal flour

The finish

• sesame seeds, to scatter
• or nigella seeds
• a little water, to brush
• flour, for the work surface

To serve

• sheep’s milk cheese
• fresh herbs, whole
• tomatoes and cucumber
• butter and honey
• black tea

Directions

1. Start by putting the flour into a very large bowl. Add the salt to one side of the bowl of flour. Add the yeast to the opposite side of the bowl.
2. Keep them apart until the mixing actually begins. Stir the dry ingredients together with your hand. Make a deep well in the centre of the flour. Pour most of the warm water into that well. Hold back about fifty millilitres of the water. The water should be warm and never hot to the touch.
3. Add the oil and yoghurt now if you are using them. Mix with your hand until a rough dough comes together. Add the reserved water only if it looks too dry. The dough should be soft and a little bit sticky.
4. Turn it out onto a lightly floured work surface. Knead it steadily for about ten full minutes. It is ready when it is smooth and stretches thinly. Shape the dough into a smooth ball with your hands. Put it in an oiled bowl and turn it over once. Cover it with a damp cloth or with cling film.
5. Leave it in a warm place for about two hours. It should roughly double in size in that time. Divide it into three equal pieces on the surface. Roll each into a tight ball with a cupped hand.
6. Cover the balls and rest them for twenty minutes. Meanwhile heat the oven as hot as it will go. Put a baking steel or heavy tray in to heat up. Let it heat for a full thirty minutes at least. Turn on the grill element too if you have one.
7. Press it out from the centre with your fingertips. Leave a thicker border of about two centimetres. Stretch the middle thin with the backs of your hands. Press right down to the surface underneath it. The dimples stop the middle rising into a balloon.
8. Brush the surface lightly with a little water. Scatter sesame or nigella seeds over the top. Press them in gently with the flat of your hand. Open the oven and slide it onto the hot stone. Bake for about eight to twelve minutes in total. It should blister, colour in patches and puff. Finish it under the grill for a minute if pale. Watch it constantly, because seeds burn fast.
9. Remove it with a peel or with long metal tongs. A large bread in a very hot oven burns forearms. Wrap the hot bread in a clean cloth immediately. The trapped steam keeps the crumb soft and chewy.
10. Bake the other breads one at a time in the same way. Let the stone recover for five minutes between them. Serve tandir bread warm and torn by hand. Butter and honey turn it into a breakfast bread. The bread keeps well for two or three days.

Technique

• A tandir is fired outdoors for a reason. Burning wood or charcoal in an enclosed space produces carbon monoxide, which has no colour, smell or taste and kills people every year. Never fire one indoors, and never bring a still-glowing oven inside afterwards.
• The tandir belongs to a family of clay ovens found from the Balkans to India, under names including tone, tonir, tandyr and tandoor. The atlas records that shared history and does not adjudicate any single origin claim.
• Dimpling the centre firmly is what keeps the bread flat and structured. Without it the middle inflates into a single hollow balloon.
• Wrap the bread in a cloth the moment it leaves the oven. Cooling it uncovered on a rack drives off the steam that keeps it chewy.
• Bread carries real weight in Azerbaijani households. It is torn rather than cut, not dropped on the floor, and stale pieces are fed to animals rather than thrown away.

Substitutions

• Plain flour replaces bread flour and gives a softer, less chewy bread that is still perfectly good.
• Fresh yeast replaces the dried sachet; use about 20 g crumbled into the water.
• A handful of wholemeal flour swapped for white gives a darker, nuttier loaf, closer to older village bread.
• Yoghurt and oil are optional enrichments rather than traditional ones, and the plainest version is flour, water, salt and yeast alone.
• Nigella seeds, sesame seeds, or nothing at all are all correct finishes.

Variations

• Georgian shoti is baked in the closely related tone oven, shaped into a long pointed loaf rather than a round.
• Armenian lavash from the tonir is rolled far thinner and stacked in sheets, and is dried and stored for months.
• Central Asian tandyr non is stamped in the centre with a chekich, a small nail-studded stamp that makes a dense decorative pattern.
• Some Azerbaijani bakers work a handful of wholemeal or maize flour into the dough for a darker village-style bread.
• A thicker, smaller version is baked for wrapping around kebabs rather than for the table.

History

Baked against the wall of a clay tandir, an oven tradition shared across the Caucasus and Central Asia.

Frequently asked questions

What is Tandir bread?

Tandir bread is a bread & pastry from Azerbaijan: blistered flatbread slapped onto hot clay tandir walls. Baked against the wall of a clay tandir, an oven tradition shared across the Caucasus and Central Asia.

How long does Tandir bread take to make?

Tandir bread takes 25 minutes plus 2 hours rising of preparation and 15 minutes of cooking. The recipe makes makes 3 large flatbreads. It is rated medium to make.

What can I substitute in Tandir bread?

Yes, within limits. Plain flour replaces bread flour and gives a softer, less chewy bread that is still perfectly good. Fresh yeast replaces the dried sachet; use about 20 g crumbled into the water. A handful of wholemeal flour swapped for white gives a darker, nuttier loaf, closer to older village bread. Yoghurt and oil are optional enrichments rather than traditional ones, and the plainest version is flour, water, salt and yeast alone. Nigella seeds, sesame seeds, or nothing at all are all correct finishes.

What is the most important thing to get right in Tandir bread?

Keep them apart until the mixing actually begins. Stir the dry ingredients together with your hand. Make a deep well in the centre of the flour. Pour most of the warm water into that well. Hold back about fifty millilitres of the water. The water should be warm and never hot to the touch.