Tandoor?

Unknown

Hi!

I can't find any info on how hot these things get and if they can be used to make naan just like a traditional tandoor.

Any ideas?

Also what size would be the best if we were to use this for mainly a tandoor oven?

Thanks!

fishlessman

i dont know much about tandoor ovens, but naan has been done by others. typically no one here cooks above about 850, but with some precautions ive cooked at temps higher than 1100.

Jersey Doug

The tandoor at our friends' Kashmiri restaurant runs at 800º F. Based on my experience with pizza I'd be tempted to try a baking stone in the egg at 550º or so.

Richard Fl

Here is one way I have done them.

Chicken, Pieces, Tandoori, Richard Fl




INGREDIENTS:
20-30 Pieces Chicken, Skin on of off, your choice
2-3 Cups PLAIN Yogurt
4-6 Tbs Tandoori Paste, PATAK'S Spicy Ginger & Garlic, Marinade & Grill Sauce




Procedure:
Marinade:
1 Take the chicken pieces and score deep cuts into the meat to allow the tandoori marinade to penetrate the meat.
2 Mix the yogurt and tandoori paste together, about 2 parts yogurt and 1 part tandoori sauce, and spoon into the cuts and all over. Place in a non-reactive container, I used a gallon ziploc bag.
3 Place in refrigerator 8 hours, overnight is OK but not longer. Remove from refrigerator 1 hour before cooking and let come to room temperature.
Cooking:
1 Set large BGE up indirect, plate setter legs up, got BGE to 400°F w/ apple wood for smoke, and placed the chicken in the BGE. Had 2 full size grills with the chicken layed out over the aluminum mesh from Wally World. Keeps things from falling down.
2 Temperature dropped to 250°F, due to mass of cold meat. Got back to 400°F and let cook for 45 minutes.
3 After 45 minutes removed the indirect set-up and cooked all on one grill another 25 minutes direct at 350°F. Pulled when the breasts reached 160°F and the thighs/drumsticks 170°F.
4 Served with split red lentil soup and french fries with curry sauce. Yes, Curry Sauce, not bad.


Yield: 6-8 Servings
Cooking time: 1 hour and 20 minutes

Recipe Type
Main Dish, Poultry

Recipe Source
Source: BGE Forum, Richard FL, 2007/10/21

fishlessman

pizza stone sitting vertical in a rib rack would work well, i think thats whats been used in the past. unless the egg was only used at high temps, the insides get black and dont look good as a cooking suface, i would run it at 800, the gasket would probably need upgrading if the egg was only seeing high temps all the time

Smokey

I bookmarked this last year, but have yet to try it!!

http://fxcuisine.com/default.asp?language=2&Display=1&resolution=high

fishlessman

i wonder what the reason is for cooking it vertical, a well raised pizza stone up close to the dome would probably accomplish the same thing in the egg

Smokey

I agree! I will try it some day.

So many things to cook ... so little time

RhumAndJerk

I just use the platesetter and a pizza stone to cook Naan at a high temp.
When I have cooked meat on skewers in the past, I have inserted them through the chimney in the dome and threaded another metal skewer through the loops to hold them in place.
A couple of things that I observed was that the bottom piece of meat was almost always burnt beyond use. Also, it helps to somehow separate the skewers so that the meat is cooking on all sides.
I have also seen the meat pieces slide down the skewer until the meat firms up.

Hope this helps,
RhumAndJerk

Unknown

fishlessman wrote:

i wonder what the reason is for cooking it vertical, a well raised pizza stone up close to the dome would probably accomplish the same thing in the egg

Hi!

Thanks for all the great input. Actually the reason why naan is upright like (i read) is that is that the naan is supposed to be slapped against the tandoor wall. It sticks to the wall, soaks out the heat from the wall, and then bakes the bread.

Real naan is actually supposed to be a flat bread. Water, flour, salt.. maybe a bit of yoguhrt. The more 'airy' the dough (using yeast), the less heat it needs to cook.

If you've had real naan (which is available here in Toronto of course) it's.. oh i dont know.. maybe a couple inches longer and wider than a keyboard, crispy on outside, chewy on inside, thinish, but dense, and foldable yet still crispy on the outside. It's non yeasted. To cook the naan like this, the dough really needs to suck the heat out of the walls. A minority of places in toronto make it like this. With real naan, you can just chew and chew almost like gum hehe and is way better than the other stuff. It's always served folded over several times. The common naan that people make is actually just pizza dough. (well.. that's how it's cooked, and what it really is.. one indian book author said that).

And lets talk about real tandoori chicken while i'm at it.. or maybe fake tandoori chicen. well.. whatever i know is that it's red over here and has no yoguhrt marinade at all. The resturaunts do this i'm sure to keep costs down. I pesonaly like it far better than yogurt tandoori chicken. The chicken is just coated with a blazing red oil based paste or powder and usually comes out fairly dry on the outside, and moist only on the most inside. It's especially good with white meat cubes. It should look something like this:

http://punjabgroceryplus.com/images/483888114_405aff0519[1].jpg

I'm not trying to say people are making it worng, but if meat is falling off the bone, then it's been cooked at too low of a temp and for too long. The hot tandoor will cook the outside to the point it's dryish, seals in the moisture, and the burnt spice on the outside tips of the chicken give a unuique flavor.. you have to have it to know what i mean and that oven really has to be up to the task. Actually.. I've never been to a resturuant once over here that used a yogurt based marinade.

I'm really hoping that with the Green Egg I can cook like this becuase I certainly don't want to be ordering and building tandoori ovens! I need that 800 degree heat for sure and walls thick enough to cook those naans properly.

Little Steven

I dunno,

I can get some good naan in Brampton.

Steve

Unknown

http://www.eggheadforum.com/index.php?option=com_simpleboard&func=view&id=106439&catid=1

Willie Lump Lump

I tried and failed with my first tandoor chicken. Posted here and got this link http://www.bbqblue.com.au/smoke_woods/site_files/cordon_blue_roasting_chicken.html
From someone down under.
This isn't what your looking for but it had a good explaination of the process.
The key was finding a good paste, got mine at an international market. I wouldn't have come close with homemade. Did a hot cook with no smoke.
TTFN WLL

fishlessman

you will be able to do that in an egg with the pizza stone mounted vertically, 800 degrees isnt a problem except that the origional gasket wont last. you will need a rutland gasket and one of the members here can set you up with that. i would like to try pizza on a naan bread, maybe soon. pizza cooks are my 1100 degree cook and i like a super thin crispy yet chewey crust and with just a little charring on the edges, 1100 degrees and about 50 seconds makes its great as there is no time for that bread to rise as it starts to cook. if your going to try cooking it on the walls you might need to bring it up a little higher in temp as there will be some cooling action from the outside as well as opening and closing the dome, i think the verticle pizza stone would be the way to go though. there was someone here that cooked naan on the inside of a flower pot inside the egg but i would be worried about that pot breaking or exploding if there was moisture in it

Unknown

fishlessman wrote:

i like a super thin crispy yet chewey crust and with just a little charring on the edges, 1100 degrees and about 50 seconds makes its great as there is no time for that bread to rise as it starts to cook.

Yes bingo. This is how you make the naan. Naan is basically pizza dough.. it's all in how you cook it and treat the dough so the oven really needs to be up to the task. If you make it like this than this green egg can make naan.

Do you know how long the heatup time is?

fishlessman

i use a 500,000 btu weed burner to start the lump, about a half hour to 45 minutes and the egg is up to 900 with fresh lump and a good light with the torch. it holds those temps for about an hour and then starts to climb to 1100 and past. you will see blue flames coming out the top at 1100 so you will either need to block the flow with some fire brick under the verticle stone if your using one or cook it flat which i think would be fine at these really high temps, or cook in the 850 to 900 degree range. with my pizza setup there is actually a ball of blue flame hovering over the pizza as it cooks. you will need to contact rrp on this site for the gasket info, charwoody for band clip info (find him on the primo site). you will need to make or have made those band clips as with the high heats the bands lengthen with thermal expansion and the dome will fall out with out them. the internal firebox and ring will eventually crack, mines in over 9 pieces but still works fine. wear protective clothing, gloves, safety glasses and do some other cooks until you get comfortable with flashback, reveiw flashbacks on the naked whizes site. not too many of us cook over 900 degrees, im sure that bge frowns on this, but they have never said anything to that effect that i can remember.