Topic: Saturday Kitchen Live - tandoori cooking

[George]

For the 200th edition, they installed a gas fired tandoor in the studio but stressed that charcoal-fired is much better. See the various guests' attempts to get naan dough to stick inside the tandoor. Even the guest Indian chef fails at his first attempt.

The tandoor bit starts at about 5minutes in.

Catch it while you can:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/i/wdmdq/

[Graeme]

George and Curry Monsters, yes i seen the show!

The "chef" used the term nan bread i thought a nan is a bread. Its like saying a bread bread and he's a chef.

I have been looking into buying a charcoal tandoori oven for my garden but on the show the chef said "don't bother"

[Razor]

Hi Graeme,

The "chef" used the term nan bread i thought a nan is a bread. Its like saying a bread bread and he's a chef.

I think to describe naan as 'naan bread' is correct.  Ciabatta is a bread, and is often referred to as 'ciabatta bread' so I think the same can apply for naan.

Ray

P.S, I preferred your original, unedited  reply in this post, gave me a bit of a giggle

[Peripatetic Phil]

I think to describe naan as 'naan bread' is correct.  Ciabatta is a bread, and is often referred to as 'ciabatta bread' so I think the same can apply for naan.

Interesting : I wonder whether the expression "Na[a]n bread" is subconsciously inspired by considerations of euphony ?  Whilst I might say "Na[a]n bread", I would never say "Keema na[a]n bread" but would automatically shorten it to "Keema na[a]n".  And I would never append "bread" to "Chapatti", "Paratha" or "Roti", all of which are already polysyllabic.

** Phil.

[Razor]

Phil,

It's a good point.  Naan or Nan, pronounced 'Nahn' is often appended by 'bread' whereas Chapatti or Roti are not.

Another thing, I have no problem with referring to, two or more naan, as just Naan, whereas if I was referring to two or more Chapatti or Roti, I would definately use the words Chapatti's or Roti's?

Phil, you seem to be a well educated man, do you think that I could be using bad grammar here?

Ray

[Peripatetic Phil]

Phil, you seem to be a well educated man, do you think that I could be using bad grammar here ?

The whole notion of "bad grammar" has been more-or-less thrown out of the window by the current school of descriptive grammarians    And when it comes to trying to formalise a grammar for loan words (such as naan, chapathi or roti) within the context of everyday English usage, your guess would be as good as anybody's !  As regards the plural form, which I think was your real point, I treat all three of naan, chapathi and roti as both singular and plural, simply because I know that that is how they are used by native speakers (by listening to the waiter when he reads back the order).  But there are many loan words from Indic languages which have been incorporated into standard English, and these now all take the plural "s" (bungalows, pyjamas, dungarees, jodphurs, and so on), so there is no reason to think that within a fairly short time naan, chapathi and roti will not have become fully assimilated into our English language and pluralised accordingly (i.e., take the plural "s").

** Phil.

[George]

Oh dear. It took a long time for any comment on that TV prog and then all we get is a debate on a trivial aspect.

[Razor]

Sorry George, to trivialise your post but a member had made an observation which I think deserved a response.

As for the show, well, did you expect some highly intellectual conversation over watching somebody do something that we already know about?

If so, sorry to let you down

Ray

[Peripatetic Phil]

I was planning to watch it, and indeed tried, but got totally p1ss@d off when I discovered that the BBC's i-player seemingly cannot search to a random location, and I didn't want to sit and wait five minutes for the tandoori bit to start.  Anyhow, I left it buffering, and have just restarted it, and am now watching.  First comment, the chef's credentials are excellent, and his "naan bread" didn't come across as strange-sounding to me.  More when I have watched more.

Hmm, I've watched more : now I remember why we don't watch terrestrial television     The BBC seem unable to separate their two missions -- to educate and to entertain -- and insist on conflating both in each and every programme.  If only this were presented with "to educate" uppermost in their corporate mind, it could be great; as it is, they have to trivialise things by ensuring that it "entertains" at the same time.  Not for me, I am afraid, though I will force myself to watch it to the bitter end.

Or maybe not.  Anyhow, the recipe is online, so I think some of us had better try it and see how we get on.  Interesting that the web site says "squab" (young pigeon) : I didn't hear anyone on the programme mention that.

Now even more confused : since when has product placement been permitted on the BBC ?  "Yalumba Bush Vine 2008" at Majestic from GBP 7.99 ?  I thought I paid my licence fee in order to not to have to put up with this sort of covert advertising : how much did Yalumba and Majestic pay in order to gain this preferential treatment, I wonder ?

Final afterthought : I wonder if I can make an FoI enquiry as to how much Yalumba and Majestic paid for product placement, and then submit this in evidence when the Government next review the BBC's application to increase its licence fee ?!

** Phil.

[Ramirez]

BBC's i-player seemingly cannot search to a random location

That's odd Phil, as I am able to move to any part of the video.