Poori or Puri is a traditional Indian fried bread that is delicious to enjoy with almost any main dish, normally curry. It’s a simple unleavened bread made from just self-raising flour, salt, sugar and buttermilk.

We grew up eating puris with mince curry or dhal curry. My mom learned to make the loveliest puris from our Indian friends. As we were a big family and my mom had to do lots of cooking, she would just roll the dough out as thinly as possible on the table and cut into shapes using a sharp knife. I used the same method as well as using a large round cookie cutter or glass.

It’s important to get the dough right, so that your puris are not dry and tough. Leave the dough to rest for at least half hour before rolling.

Add a bit of salt to your oil before frying the puri in it, to avoid making the finished product extremely oily.

Leave to drain on kitchen towels after frying.

The sugar caramelises to give your puris a beautiful colour. Also, make sure to get the temperature of the oil just right. Frying puris in very hot oil can burn them. Fry over medium/high heat.

Ingredients:
4 cups self-raising flour
1 tsp salt
1 Tbsp sugar
1 & 1/2 cups buttermilk
Oil for deep frying

Method:

Mix all the ingredients together in a mixing bowl.

Knead dough for a few minutes until dough no longer sticks to your hands or surface.

Cover and leave the dough to rest for at least 30 minutes.

Roll out very thinly, cut into circles, rectangles, any shape that takes your fancy!!

Fry in medium to hot oil until puri puffs up, 2 minutes, turn and fry the other side. 

***To make your own buttermilk ***

1 & 1/2 cups milk, add 3 tablespoons of either vinegar or lemon juice and let it stand for a few minutes before using.

During Ramadan my mom used to make treats for us by filling the puris with slices of viennas or left over mince curry to be enjoyed when breaking our fasts.