Eish Merahrah

Ground fenugreek goes into the dough, and the loaves are spread out wide and thin with the hands.

Vegan.

Ingredients

• 500 g fine maize flour
• 250 g wholemeal wheat flour
• 3 tablespoons fenugreek seeds, ground
• 250 g active sourdough starter
• 500 ml warm water
• 14 g salt
• coarse bran, for the boards

Method

1. GROUND FENUGREEK GOES INTO THE DOUGH, and three tablespoons of it is a great deal. Fenugreek is bitter and smells strongly of maple and curry, and in this quantity it is the dominant flavour of the bread -- not a background note. It also does something structural: fenugreek is high in soluble fibre and makes the dough noticeably slippery and extensible, which is what lets a maize-heavy dough with very little gluten be spread out thin without tearing. Leave it out and you have a plain maize flatbread that handles badly.
2. THE LOAVES ARE SPREAD OUT WIDE AND THIN WITH THE HANDS, NOT ROLLED. Pressed and pushed outward on a bran-dusted board to about thirty centimetres across and half a centimetre thick. A rolling pin on a low-gluten dough tears it; hands can feel where it is thinning and work round the weak spots.
3. IT IS MOSTLY MAIZE AND THAT IS WHY IT WILL NOT STRETCH. Five hundred grams of maize to two hundred and fifty of wheat. Maize has no gluten at all, so the wheat and the fenugreek together are the only things holding it; the dough is soft and slightly crumbly and must be handled gently throughout.
4. IT FERMENTS OVERNIGHT WITH A SOURDOUGH STARTER. Twelve hours at room temperature. A long cool ferment is what makes a maize dough workable -- it hydrates the maize fully and develops enough acidity to strengthen what gluten there is. Rushed in two hours it is sandy and falls apart on the board.
5. IT IS BAKED FLAT AND FAST AND DOES NOT PUFF. 240°C for eight to ten minutes. There is not enough gluten to hold a pocket and it is not meant to -- this is a flat, dense, chewy bread, and expecting it to inflate is expecting the wrong thing.
6. IT IS STACKED AND KEPT, AND IT KEEPS WELL. Cooled, stacked, wrapped in cloth. The maize and the acidity between them keep it good for several days, which is part of why it is made in large flat rounds.
7. The fenugreek seeds GROUND to a powder.
8. The maize flour, wheat flour, ground fenugreek and salt mixed, then the starter and warm water worked in to a soft, slightly crumbly dough.
9. Covered and left to ferment OVERNIGHT, about 12 HOURS, at room temperature.
10. Divided into 4 and each SPREAD OUT BY HAND on a bran-dusted board to about 30 cm across and 5 mm thick. NOT rolled.
11. Rested on the boards 30 MINUTES.
12. The oven heated to 240°C with a tray or stone inside.
13. Baked 8 to 10 MINUTES, until set and lightly browned. It will NOT puff.
14. Cooled, stacked and wrapped in cloth.
15. TESTED: it should smell strongly of fenugreek and be flat and chewy. Sandy or crumbling means it did not ferment long enough.
16. Keeps 4 days.

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