Punjabi tandoori cooking facts for kids
Example of Punjabi tandoori cooking, being cooked is Tandoori chicken.
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| Place of origin | Punjab region |
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| Region or state | South Asia |
| Created by | Punjabi people |
Punjabi tandoori cooking is a special way of making food using a unique clay oven called a tandoor. This cooking style comes from the Punjab region in Pakistan and northwestern India. The tandoor is a traditional oven, often found in homes and villages in Punjab. People use it to bake delicious breads like roti and naan, and to cook famous dishes like tandoori chicken. Sometimes, villages even have shared tandoors for everyone to use!
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Delicious Tandoori Dishes
Punjabi tandoori cooking includes many tasty foods. Here are some popular ones:
Tandoori Roti
Tandoori roti is a type of flatbread. In the past, people in Punjab villages would bring their dough to outdoor tandoors. A person called a "tandooriya" would then roll the dough and bake it into rotis in the hot oven. Some villages in Punjab still have shared tandoors for everyone to use.
Lachha Paratha
Lachha paratha is another kind of bread baked in the tandoor. It's round and has many flaky layers, making it very delicious.
Amritsari Kulcha
The Amritsari kulcha is a crispy, flaky flatbread. It's made from refined flour and stuffed with yummy ingredients. These include potato, onion, black pepper, chili, cumin, and dried pomegranate seeds. After being filled, it's cooked in the tandoor until golden.
Tandoori Chicken
Tandoori chicken is a very famous dish. Some experts believe that similar chicken dishes might have been made thousands of years ago! Ancient ovens, much like today's tandoors, have been found in places where the Harappan people lived around 3000 BCE. They even found chicken bones with burn marks, suggesting they cooked chicken in these ovens.
However, tandoori chicken as we know it today became popular in the Punjab region before India and Pakistan became separate countries. In the late 1940s, three Punjabi men named Kundan Lal Jaggi, Thakur Dass, and Kundan Lal Gujral made it famous at their Moti Mahal restaurant in Peshawar.
Naan
Naan is a soft, fluffy flatbread made from white flour. It often has a little ghee (clarified butter) added to it. When baked, it's slapped onto the side of the tandoor oven. This makes it cook partly hanging vertically, giving it its unique tear-drop shape.
Other Tandoori Treats
- Amritsari tandoori chicken
- Tandoori chicken kebab
All About the Tandoor Oven
Punjabi tandoori cooking is all about the special oven called a tandoor. In Punjab, it's also sometimes called a "tanoor."
How a Tandoor is Made
The tandoor is usually made of clay. It's shaped like a bell and is traditionally set into the ground. People light a fire inside using wood or charcoal. The tandoor gets incredibly hot, which helps cook food quickly and evenly. While older tandoors were often buried deep in the ground, modern ones can also sit above the ground.
How Tandoors Are Used
The tandoor cooking method started in the northwest frontier region, which is now part of Pakistan, and in Punjab. Punjabi people have always used the tandoor to cook meat dishes and various breads. The tandoor is so important in Punjabi culture that it's even mentioned in their folk songs!
In Punjab villages, the communal tandoor is a special place. It's not just for cooking; it's also a meeting spot where people gather and chat.
After India and Pakistan separated in 1947, many Punjabi people moved to other parts of India, like Delhi. They brought their tandoor cooking style with them, and soon, the rest of the country discovered the amazing taste of tandoor-cooked food!
