This comforting roti and saag is meant to be eaten with your hands

Part cookbook, part memoir and manifesto, Khalil Akhtar’s first book, How to Eat with Your Hands: Roti Shoti and Other Ways to Settle In, is the kind I want to both savour and devour.

In it, the New Brunswick-based journalist, broadcaster and culinary instructor captures the process and experience of home cooking in a way that transforms even the labour of kitchen management into some of the purest pleasures and comforts of daily life.

Akhtar, who was born in Britain to a Punjabi family, begins his first chapter with roti – the foundation of most of his childhood meals growing up in small-town Atlantic Canada. He writes about messy pantries, kitchen gardens and everyday practicalities – staples always paired with the stacks of roti that appeared on the table at lunch and supper every day.

“There were no forks, knives, or spoons – just our hands. We tore and folded roti, scooped dal, squished soft eggplant. … It wasn’t a neat separation of meat and potatoes, with each forkful much like the last,” he writes, contrasting the meat-potato-vegetable dishes so common on the east coast in the eighties with their homemade chicken curries served with roti, a little achar and bits from the salad plate. “With our food, we built each bite, each a slightly different combination of contrasts.”

Another chapter, The Joy of Overcooking, digs into the dogma that one should avoid overcooking vegetables for too long, defending that with leafy greens, many nutrients become more concentrated and easily absorbed with a longer cooking time. When it comes to saag, in which pounds of leafy greens are distilled down to a few large spoonfuls, it’s easier to eat a larger volume of cooked greens that would be insurmountable in its raw state.

His Sarson da Saag is served with buttered roti, which is made with dough he suggests keeping in a dedicated device – a clean yogurt tub or a piece of Tupperware – in the fridge, so it’s always ready to solve the problem of what to make for dinner.

Roti

From Akhtar: In the case of roti, no one measures the two ingredients. Of the many billions of rotis made every day (surely a contender for the world’s most widely-eaten food), no one is pulling out scales and cups. Here, I’m offering some proportions – not because I expect you to pull out this book, turn to this page and follow them for the rest of your roti-making life. These measurements are meant to be used once. Maybe twice. They’ll give you a feel for volume, texture and consistency. And once you have that feel, it will stay with you forever.

• 700 g (about 6 cups) atta or whole-wheat flour, plus extra for dusting
• 500 ml (about 2 cups) lukewarm water

Place atta and about half the water in a large bowl. Using your hands, mix together until shaggy clumps begin to form. Add more water in 50-mililitre increments, kneading in each addition, until the dough is smooth and pliable.

With wet hands, knead the dough for about five minutes, until it becomes somewhat elastic. You may have water left over, or you may need a little more, depending on the flour. Transfer it to an airtight container and set aside at room temperature to rest for a few hours or overnight in the fridge. (Leftover dough can be stored in the fridge for several days.)

To make the roti, preheat a tawa (flat griddle) over high heat. Remove the dough from the fridge.

While the tawa heats, lightly flour the countertop and shape balls of dough, each about the size of a large egg. Place the remaining dough back in the fridge.

Working one at a time, roll a ball into a nine-inch disc, stretch it by passing it between your hands and place it on the hot tawa to cook for 30 seconds. Using a spatula, flip the roti over and cook the other side for 2 minutes, until dark spots appear on the bottom. Flip to finish cooking the first side.

As the roti puffs up, use a tea towel to push it down flat periodically, to ensure that each part of the roti is in contact with the heat. Cook for about 30 seconds. Transfer the cooked roti to a plate and keep warm under a clean tea towel. Repeat until you’ve cooked as many rotis as you need for a meal, accounting for two per person.

Serve fresh and hot. Makes 12.

Sarson da Saag

From Akhtar: This is the way to eat green leaves and their stems – cooked gently and melted down to expose their truer selves. Swap a portion of the spinach or mustard with radish greens, turnip greens, arugula or collards. If you find the greens too strong, buy a head of broccoli and chop it, stems and all, before simmering it with the peppery leaves. You’ll be amazed at how much the broccoli’s sweetness offsets the pepperiness.

• 500 g (about 1 lb) mustard greens
• 300 g (about 10 oz) spinach
• 6 Thai green chilies, coarsely chopped salt, to taste
• 3 tbsp butter, plus extra to serve
• 1 onion, minced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1-inch piece ginger, minced
• 2 tbsp whole-wheat flour or chickpea flour

Wash the mustard greens and spinach thoroughly in several changes of water to remove all grit. Chop coarsely, keeping tender stems.

Bring a few inches of water to a simmer in a large, heavy-bottomed pan. Add as many greens as fit, cover for 1-2 minutes, then add the rest. Sprinkle in the chilies and salt. Cover and simmer gently for 45 minutes, until the greens have softened. Blend using an immersion blender or mash with a mathani.

Meanwhile, melt the butter in a sauté pan over medium-high heat. Add the onion, garlic, and ginger and sauté gently for 15–20 minutes. Stir in the flour and cook for a few minutes, until the flour turns slightly golden.

Stir the flour mixture into the greens. Simmer over low heat for 30 minutes, until the saag thickens and the flavours unify. If needed, add a little water or butter to maintain a pourable consistency.

Serve hot with buttered rotis. Serves 4.

Excerpted from How to Eat with Your Hands: Roti Shoti and Other Ways to Settle In, by Khalil Akhtar, published by Goose Lane Editions