Whole Wheat Tortilla - Mexican Cousin of Indian Rotis?

Tortilla ( spelt tor-thee-ah), meaning "little cake (torta) in Spanish is a general term for a variety of foods and also refer to corn or wheat based flatbreads in Mexico and other Latin countries. Depending on  the flour used to make them, the Mexican tortillas differ in texture and a wide variety and flavours are available. Each region has its own version of flatbreads and there are definitely similarities between few of them atleast.Though  the name sounds exotic,we can say that the rich in fat tortilla is definitely a cousin of the humble Indian roti. And I too found the transition from roti to tortilla easier when I tried Sunita 's recipe of Whole Wheat Tortillas.

Ingredients:

Whole wheat flour: 3 cups

Baking Powder: 1 tsp  (reduced from the original 2 and 1/4 tsp)

Salt: 1.5 tsp

Vegetable Oil: 1 tbsp 

Milk: 1-2 cups

Preparation:

Mix together flour,salt,baking powder and oil. Add in warm milk 1 cup at a time and stir in  to get a sticky loosely formed dough. I had to add another 1 cup of milk to get a similar dough.It depends on the flour you are using. Mine definitely required extra milk as it looked like coarse sand with the original mentioned milk quantity.

Knead for two minutes to get a firm soft dough on a floured surface. Keep the dough in a bowl and let it rest covered with a damp cloth or plastic wrap for 20 minutes. It is necessary to let the dough rest else it may turn elastic and it may not properly roll out.

Take the rested dough,divide into smaller pieces and shape each into a round and rest in a bowl covered with a wrap for another 10 minutes.

Take a round, pat it into a thick disc within hands dusting it with little flour and then roll it out with a rolling pin from centre to outwards,until you get a elongated disc as thin as you want. Don't over work the dough as it will turn to be stiff. Keep the disc covered with plastic wrap or damp cloth till cooking time. Do this with each round/disc you have.

In a dry skillet or komal cook each tortilla 30 seconds per side on high. Keep covered with a napkin until ready to eat. 

Serve it with choice of sides or stuffed with rice,cheese or veggies. I served it with a chocolate chili made with pinto and pink beans.

If you love rotis you will definitely like tortillas. What differs the tortilla is the rich in fat content -traditionally lard or pork fat was used while making the dough. But here we had added just 1 tbsp of oil. Also the bresence of baking powder gives it a slightly puffed look- it puffs up a little on cooking and the insides look little layered as well. There are different versions  for the tortillas some without baking powder but this version works out for me. With whole wheat it is much more healthier as well.

The tortillas are off to AWED:Mexico at MyTastyTreats, an event by dear DK along with Two Bean Chocolate Chili which I will be posting later.