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Orange Nankhatai is a zesty, lightly sweetened, crispy yet slightly tender, and beautifully orange-flavored eggless Indian shortbread cookie.

Made with a handful of ingredients like ghee (clarified butter), all-purpose flour, sugar, orange, and semolina, these Orange Nankhatai are ready in a jiffy without any fancy equipment.

I have always loved making Nankhatai; they are simple, rustic, so irresistible, and a perfect accompaniment for tea or coffee. Over the years, I have experimented with many flavors or varied versions of Nankhatai, but Orange Nankhatai has by far been my favorite one.

I love the refreshing flavor and aroma that the orange brings to these so very decadent and everyone's favorite Nankhatai.

What is a Nankhatai?

Nankhatai comes from the Indian subcontinent, primarily from the northern areas of India and Pakistan. The name has a Persian influence. In the Persian language, Naan means bread, and Khatai means biscuit.

Nankhatai is made with a blend of different types of flour. You can use any of the flour, like all-purpose flour, wheat flour, besan or graham flour, semolina, etc. Mostly a combination of these flours is used to get the perfect texture and flavor.

I usually make a blend of all-purpose flour, besan, and semolina as I believe they bring out the best flavors and textures and elevate the level of Nankhatai.

Why you should make Orange Nankhatai

• Low sweet

• Absolutely Delicious!!

• No need for fancy equipments

• Quick and easy

• Perfect tea time snack

Ingredients for Orange Nankhatai

All-purpose flour - You will need regular maida or all-purpose flour for this recipe.

Besan/graham flour - Use regularly powdered fine besan in the Orange Nankhatai recipe and not the other grainy version available in the Indian store.

Semolina/ Rava/ Sooji - Coarse Sooji or Jada rava is perfect for this recipe. It provides a nice crunch to the cookies. Do not use the fine Sooji, as it won't yield the right result.

Ghee/clarified butter - Use room temperature ghee/clarified butter for a beautiful rustic flavor and also for the perfect shape of the cookies. Ghee keeps the shape intact and stops it from spreading thin and flat.

Granulated fine sugar - Use fine sugar or unadulterated powdered sugar for the Orange Nankhatai. Do not use the crystal or bigger chunky sugar.

Salt - Regular or kosher salt enhances the flavor of the Nankhatai.

Orange zest - Use regular orange and not mandarin or clementine for the zest.

How to make Orange Nankhatai

Preheat the oven to 320F.

Line a baking tray with parchment paper.

In a bowl, sift together all-purpose flour, semolina/sooji, besan, and salt.

Now add the granulated sugar to the bowl, or if you use regular unadulterated powder sugar, then sift that also into the bowl.

Whisk it all together to mix all the dry ingredients.

To the sifted flour mix, add the room-temperature ghee/ clarified butter and orange zest. Mix it all together and knead it into a nice soft dough. The dough should not have any cracks.

If there are many cracks, then the dough is too dry then add a little more ghee to it, just 1 teaspoon at a time, and knead the dough into a softball.

Do not add any water or milk to the dough; otherwise, it will change the texture of the Nankhatai.

The dough should not be sticky but more like shortbread cookie dough.

Using a small cookie scoop, scoop up the Nankhatai dough and shape them into nice smooth round balls.

Place them in the baking tray about an inch apart, giving them some room to expand, spread, and bake. press them gently on the top, so they don't roll off.

Bake the Orange Nankhatai in the preheated oven for 20 to 23 minutes. Check the cookies at around 18 minutes to see if they need any more baking. Continue cooking till you see some cracks on the surface.

Let the Orange Nankhatai cool down at room temperature in the baking tray itself. Do not try to move them before they cool down. The Nankhatai is very brittle when it is hot and will crumble if you try to lift it.

They will become crisp once they have cooled down completely.

Do not over-bake the Orange Nankhatai, as the over-baked Nankhatai will become too hard after cooling down. You do not need to brown the bottom of the cookies while baking as the pan is still hot when you get them out of the oven, and the Orange Nankhatai will continue to cook and brown till the pan cools down completely.

Transfer the cooled-down Nankhatai to a wire rack and let them cool down further, and then later store them in an air-tight container. They will stay good for about a month.

These are some other delicious cookies

Frequently asked questions (FAQs)

Can I add water to the dough if it's dry?

Never add any water or milk to the Orange Nankhatai dough. This is an Indian shortbread cookie and it needs to be crisp and crumbly. Adding water will make it chewy.

If you need to add more moisture to the dough then add a teaspoon of ghee extra to the dough and keep rolling to form a soft dough.

Can you add orange extract to the dough?

Yes, if you want to enhance the flavors you can add a teaspoon of orange extract to the Orange Nankhatai dough.

Can I replace all-purpose flour with wheat flour?

Yes, you can replace the all-purpose flour with wheat flour for a healthy version of Orange Nankhatai. I like the flavor all-purpose flour brings to the recipe.

Can you use Orange juice to flavor the Nankhatai?

No, never add any fluid to the Orange Nankhatai dough. Adding orange juice will create gluten in the dough making the Nankhatai chewy instead of crisp and crumbly.

How to store the Orange Nankhatai?

You can store the Nankhatai in an air-tight container in a dry cool place and they will stay good for up to 3 weeks.

Tools you will need for this recipe

(click on the links below to check them out)

Mixing bowl - Medium-size mixing bowls are perfect for kneading.

Measuring cups - Always use the right size measuring cups for the perfect yield of the recipe.

Zester grater - Using a good quality zest tool is needed as you only need the orange part of the peel and none of the white parts of the orange peel should go in the recipe or the cookies will be bitter.

Cookie baking tray - this is a very good baking tray that you can use.

Cooling racks - Cooling racks are needed to cool down the cookies and avoid moisture from building at the bottom of the Orange Nankhatai.

DROP A COMMENT IF YOU HAVE TRIED THE RECIPE. I WOULD LOVE TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR EXPERIENCES. ALSO, IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS, DO DROP A COMMENT BELOW. I WOULD BE HAPPY TO HELP.

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