Homemade Indian Bread Recipes

This homemade naan recipe is easy to make, perfectly soft and chewy, and always so delicious. I’ve included a garlic naan recipe option below too!

This soft, pillowy, buttery, irresistible flatbread has long been one of my favorite sides to order out at Indian restaurants. But while naan bread is traditionally baked inside blazing-hot Tandoor ovens in India, a homemade version is actually quite easy to make on the stovetop in a hot skillet!

My favorite homemade naan recipe is made with basic bread ingredients (flour, water and yeast) plus a generous dollop of yogurt, egg and baking powder to make the bread extra soft and chewy. I also prefer to use touch of honey as a natural sweetener for the bread. And if you feel like making garlic naan, I’ve included an (optional, yet oh-so-highly recommended) garlicky butter sauce that you can brush on the warm bread immediately after baking, plus I always like to sprinkle on some fresh parsley and a pinch of flaky sea salt too.

Authentic Indian Fry Bread

I’ve also gone back and revised this recipe to include full instructions for how to make it either 100% by hand or with with the help of a stand mixer. And I have also included options for adding in extra herbs, cheese, and/or nigella seeds to your naan bread too.

Thousands of our readers have made and loved this homemade naan recipe over the years. So if you haven’t tried it yet, grab a skillet and let’s make a batch together!

Before we get to the full recipe below, here are a few quick notes about the ingredients you will need to make this homemade naan bread recipe:

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Full instructions for how to make naan bread are included below, but here are a few quick tips to keep in mind for this recipe:

There are about a million variations (both traditional and non-traditional) that you can try when it comes to homemade naan, so please feel free to get creative and have fun with this recipe! A few of my favorite options are to…

This homemade naan recipe is easy to make, perfectly soft and chewy, and always so delicious. I highly recommend adding the garlic butter option listed below!

Homemade Naan Bread Recipe

To make the dough by hand: Instead of using a stand mixer, complete step 1 in a large mixing bowl. Add the flour, yogurt, salt, baking powder, egg, and stir the mixture until combined.  Then turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead by hand for 3 to 4 minutes, until smooth.  (The dough will still be slightly sticky, but should form into a ball that pulls away from the sides of the mixing bowl.  If it’s too sticky, add a bit more flour as you knead.)

Source: Recipe adapted from All Recipes. I also updated the photos and recipe (making the garlic butter optional; everything else is the same) in November 2020.So many naan recipes are nothing more than a basic flatbread recipe. But this one? Fluffy, bubbly and CHEWY, just like you get at Indian restaurants. It’s so incredible, you’d swear it’s just been pulled from a tandoor! Bonus: It’s mind-bogglingly easy.

, bubbly naan has eluded me for years. Every other recipe I tried – and believe me, I’ve tried so many I’ve lost count – are just basic flatbread recipes with no real crumb integrity and absolutely none of the signature

Paratha (indian Flatbread)

It’s difficult to capture how chewy and fluffy this naan bread is in a photo – so let me try to show you instead with some live action:

Yerrrrrssss. And the most incredible thing? Naan dough is so easy to make. There is no kneading involved. Really. There is nothing tricky about it at all!

Here’s what you need to make the puffiest, fluffiest, bubbliest naan of your life. No fiercely hot tandoor required (unless that’s how you roll … )

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“No yoghurt?” I used to be an advocate of yoghurt in naan bread, believing it to be the “secret ingredient” that made naan different from “just another flatbread”.

But actually, yogurt weighs the naan down and makes it a bit gummier inside. Added yoghurt is no challenge for the nuclear-level 480°C heat of a tandoor … but in a home kitchen, the naan is better without yogurt. It’s just fluffier!

This section may look lengthy, but I promise this naan recipe is not hard. I’m just breaking down the steps for you and showing thorough process photos so you can have

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My dough went further than double in size, probably triple, because it was a very hot day when I made this! It’s still ok if it rises this much.

I’m going to be honest, I’ve no idea whether you can even find Cheese Naan in India (please chime in, in the comments!). But it’s a firm favourite around my neck of the wood. Certainly this Cheese-loving Carb Monster considers Cheese Naan one of the great achievements of modern mankind.

In restaurants, cheese naan is usually made by cooking plain naan first, then cutting a slit and stuffing inside the naan with cheese to melt.

Naan Recipe No Yeast (with Yogurt)

That’s quite tedious and involves burnt fingertip agony I’m yet to fall in love with, so I’ve opted for a much simpler method:

Here’s what the inside of the cheese naan looks like – in case you’re wondering if I used enough cheese 😂 Be still my beating heart … ( excitement or cholesterol sirens? I can’t quite distinguish 🤔)

It was handy to discover that the naan recipe can be made ahead, refrigerated overnight and cooked up the next day – and it’s 100% perfect. It’s just as fluffy and soft. With the added bonus of even better flavour in the bread because as with many yeast breads, flavour develops with time!

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I feel like I’m stating the obvious here by saying that the most natural, most obvious way to use naan is to scoop and slop up curries – Butter Chicken, Rogan Josh, Dal, Tikka Masala, to name a few!

Also think uses as a wrap: Stuff them, say, with Tandoori Chicken or Chicken Tikka (use the Chicken Tikka part of Tikka Marsala), along with some fresh Indian Tomato Salad with Mint Sauce for a complete meal in a wrap.

But then I realised: I’ve been devouring an inordinate amount of naan just as it is. Straight out of the skillet, with and without butter, cold, warm, reheated – and loving it like it is.

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The lesson? Naan this good you can have it every which way. It’s 100% incredible. Make it once and I guarantee you’ll be addicted for life! – Nagi x

Just to recap, it’s Indian Week here at RecipeTin Eats! A week when I’m sharing 4 brand new recipes to make your own epic Indian feast at home:

This recipe features in my debut cookbook Dinner. The book is mostly new recipes, but this is a reader favourite included by popular demand!

Easy Naan Bread Recipe (yeast Free)

Cookbook typo (it’s ok!): The recipe in the cookbook and here on this website lists 30g/2tbsp melted ghee/butter in the ingredients. But the cookbook omitted to say that the butter should be added into the dough with the egg. I freaked out when I found this and immediately made the dough without the butter. It worked – so it’s ok! I couldn’t even tell the butter was missing. So if you remember to add it, great. If not, don’t worry! (And sorreeee….. but I’m only human. Also comforting to know this is the only instruction/ingredient typo found and it’s not a big deal!!)

Recipe video above. This is a recipe for naan bread that's fluffy, bubbly and chewy, just as it should be. Nobody will ever mistake this for just another basic flatbread! Perfect for slopping up your favourite Indian curries – yet so good that you'll happily devour it plain, straight out of the skillet.

Bearing in mind that we aren't cooking in nuclear-level 480°C hot tandoors, see in post for background notes on how I find this recipe to most closely replicates restaurant naan.

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1. Yeast – This recipe works with dry active yeast too, but the naan is not quite as soft. Follow recipe as written, including yeast quantity. Also note, rapid-rise/instant yeast normally does not need to activated in warm water but it’s a very specific step for this recipe because it yields a softer naan than adding the instant yeast directly into the dough. (Yes, we made a LOT of naan to try out all the various combinations to figure out the best one!).

2. Egg – I know this sounds strange, but we need 1/2 a large egg for one batch of this naan! Any more and it dries out the inside too much.

Just crack an egg in a bowl, whisk, then measure out 1 1/2 tbsp. OR just make a double batch of this naan so you can use one whole egg!

Naan Bread Recipes

3. Flour – Bread flour makes the softest, fluffiest naan. But all-purpose/plain flour is very nearly as good. I wouldn’t make a special trip to the supermarket just to get bread flour. But if you’ve got it, use it!

4. Ghee is clarified butter, one of the traditional fats