Easy Soft Gluten-Free Flatbread

This soft and delicious flatbread is perfect for dipping, eating alongside soup or salad, or stuffing with your favorite fillings for a hearty wrap! It is easy to make and so bread-like that you won't guess it's gluten-free.

When I think about flatbread, I often think about dipping it in a rich and creamy curry sauce...

...or in hummus, tzatziki, or some hot cheesy onion-y dip...

...and I think of a flatbread that is soft, tastes good, and has just the slightest bit of chew.

While you could use another type of bread or bun for dipping, sometimes a flatbread is the only thing that will do.

And have I got a recipe for you!

Simple Ingredients

This recipe has more ingredients than a regular wheat flour flatbread recipe, but considering it is gluten-free, it's actually still very simple. As with all my bread or baked goods recipes, I like to use gluten-free flours that are affordable, easily found, and are basic enough that they are used in many gluten-free recipes.

The dry ingredients for this flatbread is simply brown rice flour, tapioca starch, and sorghum flour, which are then whisked together with a bit of xanthan gum and salt. There is also yeast in this flatbread as I found that it gives the bread a nice flavor and extra airiness that couldn't be achieved by just using baking powder. (Read Recipe Notes below regarding yeast.)

For the wet ingredients, you need water, some light oil, and Greek yogurt. That's it!

Mix the wet and dry ingredients together really well with a spoon or stand mixer until your dough comes together, and then just let it rest in the bowl for about 20 minutes.

Working the Dough

Now, believe it or not, you can actually "knead" this gluten-free dough a bit. Kneading it doesn't actually serve the same purpose as it does for regular wheat doughs as there is no gluten to be worked. However, it does help form a smoother, more cohesive dough, just by working it for less than a minute. Kneading it on a work surface lightly dusted with rice flour also helps to make the dough less shaggy and tacky and much easier to handle.

I cut the dough into 8 equal pieces for this recipe, roll each piece into a ball, and then let it rest for 10 minutes before I start flattening them out. (Read Recipe Notes regarding making fewer and larger flatbreads from this recipe.)

In terms of flattening out the dough balls into flatbread shapes, all I use are my hands. Because this is not regular wheat dough, these will not stretch and cannot be pulled. I simply press down on the dough balls with my fingers, flipping the dough on the floured surface after a couple of presses to make sure it is not sticking. I flatten them to about 1cm thick, not wanting to go too thin as they will be harder to transfer to the pan.

Cooking the Bread

All you need is a skillet or grill to cook up the flatbread. I lightly grease my skillet over medium-high heat and carefully transfer the flatbread to the pan. The dough will break if not handled carefully, and if that happens, simple press the dough back together with your fingers on the floured work surface before trying to move it again.

Brush the tops of the flatbreads with a bit of light oil (I use extra light olive oil) and let them cook for approximately 1.5-2 minutes, until it is lightly browned on the bottom. Flip and cook another minute, again until it has browned on the underside.

Before you know it, you will end up with a stack of SOFT and delicious flatbread that is oh-so-slightly crisp on the outside and tender and very bread-like in the middle.

What Can You Eat with It?

Let me count the ways.

The first thing I always think of with flatbreads is eating them with a curry...and specifically, my Rich and Creamy Butter Chicken. Just like with Indian naan bread, you need something to mop up all that delicious curry sauce and not let it go to waste, and this flatbread is the perfect solution!

Another way I enjoy eating these is by dipping them in hummus. Go buy a tub of your favorite hummus or try making my Roasted Cauliflower Hummus, and when you eat it with a chunk of this flatbread, you will love it. It is OH-SO-GOOD.

You can also dip this in tzatziki, bean dips, hot cheesy dips, soup...basically, they are incredibly dippable! But beyond dipping, stuff one with some of your favorite fillings like grilled chicken or steak and eat it like a taco or wrap. Eat them alongside a hearty salad or comforting soup. Top it with some tomato sauce and mozzarella and make them into mini pizzas. Not only is this flatbread delicious, it's also incredibly versatile!

If you'd like to see what other sorts of breads you can make gluten-free, take a look at my Easy Oh-So-Good Gluten-Free Bagels, Gluten-Free Parmesan Sage Foccacia, and my Soft Gluten-Free Sandwich Bread. These are only just a few from several on the blog!

This recipe started out many attempts ago (15 attempts, to be exact) as a way to figure out how to make a gluten-free naan. Knowing what real naan is like made this experiment especially tough and eventually I abandoned the idea of calling it naan altogether. However, I finally got it to a point where, while this is definitely a flatbread, you could also consider it a worthy gluten-free option for naan.

So whether you call this flatbread, naan, dipping bread, pita bread...whatever...you're going to love how easy this is to make, and you'll be pleasantly surprised that gluten-free can also mean soft and delicious!

~ Lisa.