Bara for Doubles
FLUFFY
SOFT
FLAVOR
LIGHT
AIRY
Doubles
Doubles are one of the best street foods in my opinion. They consist of two fried flat breads filled with a delicious creamy garbanzo bean filling (channa). Usually topped with amazing and delicious chutneys and sauces, shredded cucumbers.
When I tell you - it is one of the most delicious things you can ever eat.
Ever. Hands down. Perfection. Whoever came up with the idea for doubles, kudos to you!
In this recipe we will be focusing on making the bara- the flat bread part of doubles.
Making doubles honestly wasn't something I knew too much about, but with trial and error and basic knowledge in bread making I came up with this recipe. It has been a staple ever since and every time I am craving a delicious doubles, I can whip this up.
Doubles in itself can be a timely process. We have to make the dough for the flat breads, make the filling, make the toppings, and that alone can seem overwhelming. While it can be a task to take on, it can go by pretty quickly once you have everything laid out. If you decided to make a tamarind chutney to accompany it, you can follow my 5-minute tamarind chutney recipe, which also saves on time!
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Oil?
I feel like the number of times I said oil in this recipe was a little bit much! But it is necessary. We will be adding oil to our dough, spreading the oil on our hands or surface when flattening it out, deep frying in oil. Now it may seem like a lot, however draining the oil from each bara well helps and our quick frying method also helps with the amount of oil absorbed.
5 seconds?
Once I saw someone make doubles, and that's when I realized just how quickly these flat breads are fried for. It honestly takes 5 to 8 seconds to fry each flat bread up, and frying so quickly ensures a light and airy bara as opposed to a heavier oily bara.
When I started frying them for such a short period of time, I realized that was one of the tricks to achieving a great result and I had to share it, hence I created my bara recipe- The original bara recipe of YouTube. Since then, there has been many other recipes come out, but I can try say I am grateful to have found out that little secret. It is wonderful to watch the older generation in the kitchen to learn their tricks!
In cup of warm water, add sugar and yeast and let sit for 5 mins to activate the yeast.
Combine Flour, saffron, geera, curry, salt, pepper, baking powder.
Mix well.
Add 1/2 tbsp. of oil, mix, then add water and knead for a couple mins. Dough will be sticky.
Add another 1/2 tbsp. of oil to coat the top of dough and rub it around the dough and knead for about another minute until soft. Do not over knead.
Make sure bowl is nice and oiled and cover dough with towel or cling wrap.
Place in a warm place to double in size.
When dough has risen, you want to oil hand and flatten it down a bit - not to deflate it all the way though.
Let sit for 5 mins.
Have your bowl or plate ready lined with paper towels to soak up extra oil and have something to cover it with so bara stays nice and warm.
Take 1 tbsp. of dough at a time and roll in to balls. You can placed rolled balls on an oiled plate or surface.
Heat some vegetable oil in pot at medium high heat.
Rub oil on your hands.
Take each 1 tbsp. bit of dough that has been rolled into ball, and flatted it out with your fingertips, from the center out.
Take off hand and stretch out a bit if you can.
Carefully place in oil.
Keep turning it around and cook for about 6 seconds.
It's a really quick fry method to make a light bara. I fried for literally 6 seconds.
After done frying press gently against side of pot for the extra heat to steam it for a couple seconds and it helps get rid of excess oil.
Fry one bara at a time since it takes such a short time to cook and turn constantly.
Cover when done with lid of pot to keep nice and warm :). Enjoy!