Time Caveats in Batch-Processing and How to Cook Rotis Efficiently

This is gonna be a fun read. Stay with me till the end of this 4-minute read and I promise you will learn something new. This is a short story about how I learned how batch-processing tasks might not always be the most efficient way of doing things.

I have a habit. A good one I suppose. Every half an hour or so, I ask my mom if there is any work that I can help her with around the house. Most times, she says that she has got things under control. However, once in a while, she will ask me to help with some menial tasks such as taking out the trash or folding the laundry.

On a momentous day a few weeks ago, as usual, I asked her if I could help her with something and she asked me to cook the rotis (aka chapati/flatbread) for lunch. Taking that up as a challenge I asked her to teach me. She said she was kidding, but not my heart was set. I HAD to learn how to cook, at least the basics. By the way, this is a skill that is super non-negotiable for guys and girls my age. In fact, to be honest, I could have started my cooking journey a decade ago.

Nonetheless, better late than never.

So, over the course of the next 3 days, I learned all the basics of cooking a roti. It basically involves the following steps:

Assess the right amount of flour and add a pinch of salt to it.

Add water and knead the dough on a large flat plate.

Add a little bit of ghee to the dough and knead it further.

Leave it be for 5–10 minutes.

Take small portions of the dough and make a small ball out of it.

Roll the dough in dry flour and prepare the roti using the roller.

Add dry flour a couple of times during the process of rolling to make sure that the dough does not stick to the roller or the plate.

Finally, after creating a relatively circular roti, time to roast it first on the frying pan and then directly on the flame till it is ready.

Apply ghee to the inner surface of the hot roti and serve.

Seems fairly straightforward and simple, right? If you had to cook one roti, the process is easy and not really time-consuming. However, you need to cook several in quick succession.

Over the course of the next few weeks, I improved my skills by practicing the art of roasting the roti without burning it (the toughest part) and controlling the intensity of the flame. However, I wanted to go further. There came my obsession with automation and process design.

I experimented with various ways to reduce the overall time taken to cook rotis. One of the key things I tried was batch-processing the steps at hand. So I did the following.

Knead and prepare the dough.

Make small balls of dough and roll them dry flour. (Batched together — So, I essentially prepared around 20 balls before I even turned on the flame)

Roll the dough into a circular shape. (Batched again for 20 rotis)

Roast the rotis one by one. (Batched)

Apply ghee on the rotis. (Batched)

After completing the batching process, I realized that I took almost 20 extra minutes to cook all the rotis! Also, the quality and softness of the rotis were compromised.

Where did the extra time come from? I realized that the inefficient use of time when roasting the rotis. While roasting, you need to wait around 30 secs to 1 minute for each roti to heat up enough before cooking them over the flame. While I waited, I literally had no other job to do and I could not move away from the kitchen counter to do something either (due to the risk of burning the roti in the short span).

I realized that my mom saved that time by effectively using it to make the dough balls and rolling them while simultaneously cooking them over the frying pan. Talk about multi-tasking ehh? So, batch-processing the tasks is definitely not the most efficient way to go about cooking I suppose.

It will probably take me a slightly longer time to be as efficient as her for cooking (considering that she has been cooking for about 3 decades), I have a lot to learn. Though, I am definitely learning more and more every day.

P.s. 70% of the time, I now cook the rotis for the house not only to help her, but I secretly love doing it!

Masterchef Shubham? Onwards and Upwards!