Two soft turmeric flatbreads folded around curried chickpeas, tamarind, and pepper sauce — Trinidad’s street-corner breakfast.

Where does Doubles come from?

Doubles is a Trinidadian dish from Port of Spain, Trinidad & Tobago.

Can Doubles be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?

Yes. This Doubles recipe includes ingredient substitutions to make it vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, or egg-free — including several of those at once, such as gluten-free and dairy-free together.

How long does Doubles take to make?

About 70 minutes total (30 minutes prep, 40 minutes cooking), serving 4.

Recipe

Name: Doubles
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 40 min
Total time: 70 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Trinidadian
Ingredients: 2 cups all-purpose flour (for the bara); 1 tsp ground turmeric; 1 tsp instant yeast; 3 cups chickpeas (channa), cooked; 2 tbsp curry powder; 1 tsp ground geera (toasted cumin); 4 cloves garlic, minced; 1 onion, diced; 1/4 cup culantro (shado beni) or cilantro, chopped; to taste Scotch bonnet pepper sauce; 1/4 cup tamarind sauce; for frying neutral oil

North America → 🇹🇹 Trinidad & Tobago → Port of Spain

Doubles

Trinidadian · medium · serves 4

prep 30 min · cook 40 min

~778 cal · 34g protein · 141g carbs · 9g fat (estimated, per serving)

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Doubles: curried chickpeas on turmeric flatbreads with sauces

🇹🇹 Port of Spain

Doubles came out of the Indian indenture communities of central Trinidad in the 1930s, when a vendor doubled the bara flatbread for a hungrier customer and the name stuck. Ordering has its own grammar: "two with slight pepper" gets you understood in Port of Spain.

Make it yours

Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.

🥕 Vegetarian

🌱 Vegan

🌾 Gluten-Free

🥛 Dairy-Free

🥜 Nut-Free

🥚 Egg-Free

Ingredients

Serves 4 —

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2 cups all-purpose flour (for the bara)

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1 tsp ground turmeric

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1 tsp instant yeast

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3 cups chickpeas (channa), cooked

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2 tbsp curry powder

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1 tsp ground geera (toasted cumin)

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4 cloves garlic, minced

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1 onion, diced

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1/4 cup culantro (shado beni) or cilantro, chopped

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to taste Scotch bonnet pepper sauce

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1/4 cup tamarind sauce

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for frying neutral oil

Instructions

Make the bara dough: flour, turmeric, yeast, salt, and enough warm water for a soft, slightly sticky dough. Rest 1 hour until puffy.

Cook the channa: fry the onion, garlic, and curry powder in oil, add chickpeas and water to cover, and simmer 25 minutes until soft and saucy, mashing a few. Finish with geera and culantro.

With oiled hands, flatten small dough balls into thin 4-inch rounds.

Fry each bara in hot oil 20–30 seconds per side — they should puff and stay soft, not crisp.

Overlap two bara, spoon channa over, and finish with tamarind and pepper sauce. Eat standing up, leaning forward.

Port of Spain street-vendor tradition.

Ratings & reviews

No reviews yet — be the first to cook it.

🌏 While it simmers — know your destination

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Port of Spain. Carnival city, where breakfast is a bara stuffed with channa.

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Trinidad & Tobago. Indian, African, and Creole cooking on one small twin-island.

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North America. A collision of Indigenous, colonial, and immigrant tables.

The story behind this dish is up top — worth a read while the pot works.

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Richard Moore & Kelsey Tucker

Recipes cooked, tested, and researched by the creators of Spin the Globe. How we build our recipes →