Garlic Vegan Naan

A soft, pillowy, restaurant-style vegan naan with a delicious topping of garlicky, herbed vegan butter

Naan is perhaps one of the most popular Indian flatbreads on any restaurant menu, for good reason. This soft, fluffy flatbread, typically baked in a clay oven called a tandoor, is not only smoky and uniquely delicious, but it makes for divine eats when dunked into spicy Indian stews and curries. Naan recipes usually include milk or yogurt to create a softer, fluffier bread, but making a vegan naan that's just as delicious without the dairy is very possible. Here I will show you how to make the perfect vegan naan that will rival any naan you ever ate at the finest Indian restaurant.

VEGAN NAAN

A soft, fluffy, pillowy naan is everyone's favorite Indian flatbread. And a surefire testament to its popularity is the fact that in recent years, it's become a common offering at grocery stores like Aldi's and Trader Joe's, rubbing shoulders with other favorite global flatbreads like pitas and tortillas.

Jay loves it so much that every time we are at the store, he'll beg me to buy some so once we get home, we can pop it into the oven to warm it up, then tear it with our fingers and dunk it into a spicy hot curry for a delicious weekend lunch.

But easy as it is to buy a naan, or eat one at a restaurant, it's not that much harder to make one yourself, in your own kitchen. So on days when I am not madly rushed, I'll stop Jay right before he tosses a packet of naan into the grocery cart. Instead, when we get home, I'll roll up my sleeves and make some vegan naan bread myself (I even have a whole wheat naan recipe on the blog and a vegan gluten-free naan in case you're gf--check it out!). And to make it even more special, I'll brush on an herby vegan garlic butter.

A homemade naan not only tastes better, because it doesn't have all those preservatives that store-bought bread does, it also has a better texture, and it's, of course, better for you. Especially when it's vegan and therefore free of artery-clogging butter and ghee. Once you've made it, you might find it hard to go back.

Making a naan bread, including vegan naan bread, is super simple too, and it really doesn't need any fancy equipment. All you need is your hands. And while you'll hear a great deal of talk about how naan made in a traditional clay tandoor oven needs temperatures as high as 800 degrees to cook -- a range a humble home oven cannot achieve -- don't lose heart. This naan recipe I am about to share with you today is made on a screaming-hot griddle on the stovetop, and it's faster than any oven with results just as good as anything you'd get from the restaurant or store. Or better.

Ingredients

• All purpose flour. Don't substitute this with whole wheat flour if you want a truly authentic experience. You can make a naan with whole wheat but it just won't be as fluffy and soft.
• Yeast
• Sugar
• Non dairy milk. Use any nondairy milk of your choice, including almond milk, cashew milk, soy milk or oat milk. You can also just use an equal quantity of vegan yogurt instead with great results.
• Vegetable oil
• Salt

For the vegan garlic butter topping:

• Garlic
• Cilantro
• Vegan butter

Tips for making the best vegan naan

• A naan, unlike most Indian flatbreads, is a leavened bread, with added yeast giving it that puffy, glorious texture. Make sure the yeast you use is active. Let the dry yeast "bloom" for five minutes in a warm (not hot) water-milk mixture with some sugar added to wake the yeast up and feed them. If your yeast doesn't become frothy after five or 10 minutes, you need new yeast. (Here's a tip for storing dry yeast for a long time and helping it stay alive: keep it in an airtight container in the freezer.)
• Use warm water to knead the dough, and make sure you don't add all of the water in the beginning. Rather, drizzle it in a little at a time until you get a dough that's still a little sticky but not wet. You don't need to continue kneading the dough once it's come together.
• Let your naan dough rise, like you would any bread dough. This step is important, because you want the yeast to go to work so your naan is puffy and soft, not flat and brittle. You may want to speed the process up, but don't. You just need an hour to 90 minutes in a warm environment (like the oven with just the light on). And good things come to those who wait.
• After the naan dough has risen, divide it into eight balls and coat them lightly with flour. Let them stand, covered, for about 15 minutes so the dough relaxes and is easier to shape.
• If you'd rather not use the vegan garlic butter topping, you can brush some water on the naan and sprinkle on a few sesame seeds or poppy seeds. Press them into the naan before placing on the griddle so they don't all fall off.
• To roast the naan, make sure that the griddle is screaming hot. If subsequent naans begin to brown too fast, just sprinkle some water on the skillet to bring down the temperature, then set to medium-high heat and continue roasting. When brown spots appear on the underside, flip the naan and cook until brown spots appear.
• Remove the naan to a plate lined with a kitchen towel and immediately brush on the herby garlic butter mixture. Keep cooked naans wrapped in the kitchen towel until ready to serve.

How to shape a naan

• The naan you'll find in restaurants and stores is usually teardrop shaped, but there really are no rules here. You can make your naan oval or round or you can just let it go free-form. Once your naan is baked up, and covered with the herby butter garlic mixture, it will look beautiful and incredibly appetizing no matter how you shaped it.
• I usually shape a naan the way I would pizza dough -- by hand. I just lift it by the edges and let the weight of the dough and gravity do the work. Let your fingers move around the edge of the dough, so you get an even shape. If there is a tear, patch it up by pressing the dough together. Once the naan is about five inches wide and seven inches long, rest it on a baking sheet and pull the long side a little more to give it that teardrop/oval shape. You can also just use a rolling pin and roll it into a teardrop shape.

What do you serve with the vegan naan?

Naan is best eaten by tearing off pieces of the soft, hot bread and dunking it a hot, spicy curry. Because a Naan is a north Indian bread, it will go well with just about any north Indian curry. Here are some ideas for saucy, Indian dishes and curries to serve with naan:

• Tofu Palak Paneer
• Aloo Matar
• Tofu Cubes in a Black Pepper Curry Sauce (Tofu "Paneer" Kalimirch)
• Vegan Butter Chicken
• Instant Pot Vegan Dal Makhani
• Chana Masala
• Mirchi ka Salan, Chili Peppers in a Peanut Sauce

Storage tips

• Store the vegan naan at room temperature for up to a day. Keep the naan loosely wrapped in a kitchen towel.
• You can place the naan in a fridge, still wrapped in a towel and placed in an airtight container, for up to four days.
• For longer storage, store the cooled naan in freezer-safe bags, preferably separated by parchment paper, or wrapped tightly in cling wrap.
• To reheat naan, thaw, if frozen, then place on a hot griddle and warm through on either side, about a minute per side.

Now let's make this vegan naan bread recipe!