Bataw

Barley and maize rather than wheat, so it will not stretch at all and is patted out between the palms.

Vegan.

Ingredients

400 g barley flour
300 g fine maize flour
100 g wholemeal wheat flour
2 tablespoons fenugreek seeds, ground
7 g fast-action dried yeast
550 ml warm water
14 g salt
coarse bran, for the boards

Method

IT IS BARLEY AND MAIZE RATHER THAN WHEAT, so it will not stretch at all and is patted out between the palms. Four hundred grams of barley and three hundred of maize against only a hundred of wheat. Neither barley nor maize forms gluten, so this dough has almost no elasticity: it cannot be kneaded in any meaningful sense, it will not hold a shape under tension, and a rolling pin cracks it straight across. Instead a ball is taken up and patted from hand to hand and then pressed down on a bran-dusted board, which works the dough by compression rather than by stretching. The result is dense, close-crumbed and faintly sweet from the maize, and it is a different object from any wheat flatbread.
THE DOUGH IS MIXED AND LEFT ALONE, NOT KNEADED. Stirred to combine and then covered. There is nothing to develop -- kneading a gluten-free dough only dries it out and makes it crumble further.
IT IS WETTER THAN IT LOOKS LIKE IT SHOULD BE. Five hundred and fifty millilitres to eight hundred grams. Barley and maize both drink a great deal and go on absorbing for the first half hour, so a dough that seems right at mixing will be dry and cracking by the time it is shaped.
IT IS RESTED AN HOUR BEFORE SHAPING AND THE FLOURS VISIBLY CHANGE. The mixture goes from gritty and loose to smooth and claylike. Shaped straight after mixing, the rounds crack at the edges as they are pressed.
THE ROUNDS ARE THICK -- A CENTIMETRE AND A HALF. Not thin. With no gluten there is nothing holding a thin round together and it will break when lifted; thick, it has enough body to move and bakes into something that can be torn.
IT IS BAKED MODERATELY AND FOR LONGER THAN A WHEAT FLATBREAD. 220°C for eighteen to twenty minutes. A thick low-gluten round needs the time to cook through, and a fierce short bake leaves a raw heavy centre.
The fenugreek seeds GROUND to a powder.
The barley, maize and wheat flours, ground fenugreek, yeast and salt mixed, then the warm water stirred in. NOT KNEADED.
Covered and RESTED 1 HOUR, until the mixture goes from gritty to smooth and claylike.
Divided into 8 balls.
Each PATTED FROM HAND TO HAND and then pressed down on a bran-dusted board to about 1.5 cm thick and 14 cm across. NOT rolled.
Rested on the boards 30 MINUTES.
Baked at 220°C on a preheated tray 18 to 20 MINUTES.
TESTED: it should be dense and close-crumbed with no raw centre, and should tear rather than bend. Cracked edges mean the dough was shaped before it had rested.
Keeps 3 days; good toasted after that.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Egypt · All recipes