Nostalgic.

So there is a valid reason as to why I haven't updated in a little over two months. I was away. In a faraway land. My family, on both sides are from Mauritius. It's a little island, off the coast of Madacascar, in the Indian Ocean. Which begs the question: Why did they come here? Where it's cold almost eight months of the year. Believe me, I ask the question of why do I live here?? Mostly when I'm scraping the snow off of my car.

 

The very first things I ever learned how to cook were Mauritian. And I grew up in a odd hybrid of languages in terms of cooking. It took me ten years to figure out that cinnamon and canelle were the same things. One is just in french, which is what it was referred to in my house. But it was kept in a jar with no label on it, so I never knew that they were the same things, until I started cooking myself. Same thing with cilantro.

 

When I first started cooking I made rougaille and lentils, which is pretty typical Mauritian. Rougaille is simple, it's like a tomato sauce and then you add things to it, like eggs or salmon or any type of fish. The lentils were complicated for me though. I had to burn them completely, and then add too much water to know for sure how you were supposed to cook them.

So I decided to learn from the best while I was in Mauritius. (The best are otherwise known as my Grandmother and anyone else who wanted to show me how to make stuff). And the first thing I wanted to blog was making roti. It isn't really Mauritian roti, as I'm sure other people make it the same way, but we made it in Mauritius, does that count?
Here is the kicker. I don't have a recipe to link to. And I don't have proper measurements, just proportions.

So mixing brown and white flour is fine. It still tastes good. But these rotis are pretty high in fat seeing the amount of oil you put in them.
So I wouldn't make them all the time...

So here is what I documented.
2 cups of white flour
2 cups of brown flour
Pinch of salt
1 Tablespoon of oil
Hot water.

Measure out the flour and add the salt. Then add the oil and the hot water. Mix it with you hands all together. You might need to add more water and more oil but just put it all together so that you have something that looks consistent. Like this.

Then comes the rolling part. The experts (like my Grandma) can roll the dough so that it turns on its own and you get a perfect circle. Me? Not so much. I fumbled my way through it until they took the rolling pin away from me. Apparently, I'm no good at rolling.

So you take about baseball size dough and roll it out. Then you brush it with oil and fold it up into a square and let it sit. Then you roll the oiled dough again, and THEN they are ready to be cooked. Got that?

Heat a frying pan and brush it with oil. Fry for a minute per a side. The experts can touch the roti with their bare hands because they have no feeling left in the tips of their fingers, while I try and flip them awkwardly with utensils. It's a good time.

I would have fulfilled my blogger duties if I had actually taken a picture of the end product. But it was hot, and I had just spent all of this time making them (well, that's a lie, I REQUESTED them, and assisted in rolling two). So I didn't take any picture of it when they were done. Needless to say, they were good.

This whole roti expedition was made possible by my aunt Pom (pictured on the right). She agreed to make roti even though it was crazy hot out and rolling is a lot of work. We actually did the rolling in her garage...

And I searched the internet for what the end product should look like and shamelessly stole this picture, purely for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy.