Tandoor Naan vs. Frozen Naan: How to Find Real Naan in Denver

Naan seems like the simplest thing on an Indian menu. Flour, water, yeast, a bit of yogurt. But if you've had naan in Denver that was thick, rubbery, and oddly perfect in shape, you probably had frozen naan warmed up in an oven.

Fresh naan from a tandoor is a different thing entirely. At Denver Curry House, it's baked to order. Our naan page has the full lineup.

How real naan is made

The dough is enriched with yogurt, left to rise, then stretched by hand. Not rolled with a pin, which squeezes out the air. The stretched dough gets slapped straight onto the inside wall of a tandoor, a clay oven that runs extremely hot. It cooks in about a minute. The side against the clay chars and blisters, the top puffs up with steam, and it comes out a little smoky, chewy at the edges, and soft in the middle.

Frozen naan is machine-rolled, par-baked, frozen, shipped, and reheated. No char, no blisters, no smoke. It's bread, but it's not really naan.

Four ways to tell

1. Look for char. Real naan has uneven dark blisters. Frozen naan is pale and even.
2. Check the shape. Hand-stretched naan is never a neat oval. It's lopsided, sometimes teardrop-shaped.
3. Press it. Fresh naan springs back. Reheated naan goes leathery within a few minutes.
4. Smell it. Tandoor naan smells faintly smoky. Frozen naan smells like toast.

What to order

• Plain naan: the honest test of any tandoor.
• Garlic naan: brushed with garlic butter as it comes out. Our most-ordered bread, by a mile.
• Cheese naan: stuffed and baked until the top blisters.
• Garlic cheese naan: for when you can't decide.

Naan is made for rich sauces. Use it on butter chicken or tikka masala, and don't leave any sauce behind.