Poori or Puri is an unleavened fried bread made from whole wheat flour, salt and water. In this post I am adding suji (semolina) making them more crisp from outside and yet having soft texture from inside.
Add little water at a time and knead well to form a dough. The dough should not be soft but a little stiff and tight.
Making Poori
Divide the dough into small or medium pieces – about 12-14.
Make into medium sized or slightly small balls.
Apply oil to dough ball. The idea of applying oil and not dusting with flour is so that while frying, the oil stays clean and you won’t see dark burnt flour particles inside the oil.
Roll the dough evenly into circles which are neither too thin nor thick.
Place the rolled poori in a plate and cover with a clean kitchen towel, so that they don’t dry up.
Frying Poori
Heat oil in a deep frying pan or kadai.
When the oil is sufficiently hot then add one poori at a time and fry gently pressing down with the frying spoon or slotted spoon in a circular motion.
Turn over when puffed up and fry till golden brown.
Serve poori hot with a potato curry or chutney or kurma
Notes
The dough should be slightly stiff. This is, so that the while being rolled less amount of wheat flour can be dusted on the poori. If you use too much of wheat flour for dusting then while deep frying the wheat flour particles get fried and burnt in the oil. These burnt particles then stick to the later batches of poori that you will fry.
To avoid this happening, you have one more option. While rolling, apply a little oil on the poori and then roll. This way, you won’t need to dust the rolling board with wheat flour. The oil does the trick and you can easily roll the poori.
Ensure that the oil is neither too hot nor cold. If hot, then poori get browned quickly. If not enough hot then the poori absorb oil and become too oily.
The poori should puff while frying. If not, then something has gone wrong…..
Either the dough has not been kneaded well or the poori have not been rolled out evenly or the oil is not hot enough.