Naan Kathai

These biscuits are iconic in many Indian households – it is all about that signature crack and balance of spices which makes these incredibly moreish

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NAAN KATHAI (Makes about 30, 20g biscuits)

• 125g salted butter, in 2cm cubes at room temperature (1/2 cup)
• 110g ghee (1/2 cup)
• 100g granulated white sugar (1/2 cup)
• 30g gramflour (1/4 cup)
• 30g semolina (1/4 cup)
• 220g cake flour (1 3/4 cup plus one table spoon) (I use a mixture of half 00 flour and half cake flour, as I find this gives a much more tender biscuit, but still retains the crunch).
• 1/8 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (half of a quarter teaspoon)
• 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground cardamom
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves (half of a quarter teaspoon)
• 1/8 teaspoon black pepper (half of a quarter teaspoon)
• whole, unroasted almonds for decoration

METHOD

1. Preheat the oven and prepare your trays: Pre-heat the oven to 160 degrees celcius. If you are not using a non-stick baking try, grease and line three trays with baking paper.
2. Prepare the butter, ghee and sugar: Place half the butter and half the ghee in a microwave safe bowl and melt it. The pour into a bowl that you are going to use to mix, along with your sugar and cream for a good 5 minutes. This may feel like a bit of a futile step, but it does help to dissolve the sugar a bit. Once this is done, then place the remaining ghee and butter with the rest of the cream mixture and beat for at least 12 to 15 minutes – the mixture must be very pale and light.
3. Prepare your dry ingredients: Place the flour, gramflour, semolina, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and all the spices into a bowl and give it a good whisk to combine.
4. Add in the dry ingredients: Add the dry ingredients to the creamed butter and ghee mixture in three additions. You can mix this for about a minute until it comes together (unlike shortbread type biscuits, where we try to avoid overmixing to keep a buttery texture, some gluten-development is fine here).
5. Shape and bake: Roll the dough into 20g balls. They do spread a bit in the oven, so they may initially feel smaller than you would expect. If you want, you can do 25g balls as well, but I would not go bigger. Place the biscuits on the tray – I fit 11 on a tray, in a row of 4, 3 and then 4. Bake for 12 – 15 minutes (or longer if needed). Keep a close eye on them, the high spice ratio can make them darken quite quickly.
6. Let Rest on the tray before removing: Once out of the oven, let the Naan Kathai rest on the tray for 10 minutes to firm up. They are too tender to remove by hand. Then, using a spatula, lift the biscuits off the tray and place them on a cooling rack to cool completely.
7. Storage: These biscuits will keep well for up to a week, stored in an airtight container.

Recipe by adventureswithsugar.com