Naan Khatai

While living in the hostel, in Kerala, my grandmother, uncles and aunts used to visit me often. Every time, such a visit do bring along a packet of goodies from the bakery. It could be cakes, cookies, puffs, chocolates etc. These Naan Khatai would also make it in the goodie packs. Those packets would vanish in no time when we open it in the hostels. And that could be one reason why I never got bored of those goodies.

With a lil one around at home, baking always happens to make some cake or cookie. Last week when I thought about these naan khatai, I thought I should make it for my lil one at home. And guess who had fun time placing the chopped pistachios over the cookies. Yes, the lil one helped me in making it. Every time I start baking he would drag a chair get on top of it to help me in the kitchen. 

I don't know if its his involvement from the beginning that makes him interested in cookies and cakes or if he naturally has a sweet tooth to like every single thing we make together. Anyways, these naan khatai's were awesome and everyone liked it.

Ingredients

1. 1 cup + 2 tbsp of all purpose flour
2. 1/2 cup+ 2 tbsp of powdered sugar
3. 1/2 tsp of baking powder
4. A pinch of salt
5. A stick of unsalted butter(8 tbsp) @ room temperature
6. Seeds from 2-3 green cardamom pods, crushed or powdered
7. 6-7 pistachios, chopped

Method

• In a bowl, add the ingredients 1-4. Run it through a sieve twice, to ensure everything gets mixed well. 
• Add the crushed cardamom to the dry mixture and give it a stir to ensure the cardamom is spread evenly.
• Add the softened butter to the dry mixture and knead it thoroughly to form a hard dough. Let it rest for about 30 minutes.
• Make small balls of the dough and press it between your hands to flatten it to a 1/2 inch thickness cookie. Place a pinch of chopped pistachios on the cookies. Place it on the baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
• Preheat the oven to 350F. Bake the naan khatai for about 17-18 minutes or untill they start slightly browning underneath.

Tips

1. If using salted butter, do not add salt.
2. You could substitute butter with ghee.
3. Bringing the butter to room temperature before you mix it with the dry ingredients is really important. 

Recipe courtesy : www.kitchenmonki.com

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