The Breads of Egypt: Eish Baladi - عيش بلدي

Ubiquitous, fundamental and uniquely Egyptian. Eish baladi feels like the best type of Egyptian bread to start off this series. It’s found up and down this old country of ours, it’s eaten at any time of day and has even been a symbol for the state of society. This is by far the most popular type of bread in Egypt and is ever-present in millions of Egyptian households. One of the common sights across the streets of Cairo is of those impressively agile men cycling through the insane Cairo traffic balancing wicker baskets on their heads with hundreds of loaves of eish baladi on top of them.

Man balancing bread while cycling (Source: Aljazeera)

As for the bread itself, it’s a yeasted pocket-style bread with lots of wheat bran on the outside and sometimes mixed in as well. High heat is essential here to create the large pocket which can be filled with anything. Flat discs of dough are baked directly on hot stone oven floors. The high heat expands the gas created by the yeast before the dough starts to cook through and set. This allows the bubbles to burst inside the dough and open up onto each other creating one large pocket.

For this recipe, a small amount of commercial dried yeast is used to ferment a portion of the flour for a long time. This is called a pre-ferment and injects the dough with a lot of flavor. It’s a method that requires just a little bit of planning but produces superior results to a basic dough without a pre-ferment. Whole wheat flour can be substituted by up to 20% without really affecting the results much. If you choose to use a higher percentage of whole wheat flour then you might need to add more water. It can also limit the formation of the much coveted pocket.

You have a few options to mimic the effect of a stone oven at home. I personally prefer using a baking stone and place the dough directly on it. If that’s not available for you, you can use a large inverted ceramic baking dish or a cast iron pan. You can also use a regular sheet pan and fit two or more pieces on it, which can speed up the baking process, especially if you want to make a double batch. Just make sure heat the sheet pan thoroughly and keep an eye on the dough while it’s baking because it happens fast; it’s a small piece of dough in a very hot oven after all. When you get more practice, you can roll and bake simultaneously. The sight of the dough puffing up in the oven really shouldn’t be missed.

As for what to do with it, fresh eish baladi is perfect for sandwiches since you can fill it with whatever you like. It’s great just torn by hand for all sorts of dips as well, whereas toasted or fried roughly torn pieces make a nice addition to soups and salads or for a classic Egyptian fatta. Eish baladi also freezes very well and you can just heat it up in a 180 ˚C oven for about 5 minutes and enjoy warm.

Ingredients:

500 grams all-purpose or bread flour

350 grams water

10 grams salt

½ teaspoon dry yeast

Wheat bran for dusting (about one third of a cup or 25-30 grams) - رَدَّة

Steps:

1- Start by making the pre-ferment. In a large bowl, mix 200 grams of the flour with 200 grams of the water and 1/8th teaspoon of yeast. Cover and let it sit at room temperature for 12-16 hours.

The pre-ferment should be frothy and have a yeasty, slightly sour smell

2- Next, add the rest of the water (150 grams) to the pre-ferment to loosen it up, then add the rest of the yeast, the rest of the flour (300 grams) and all the salt.

3- Transfer the dough on a clean work surface and knead for about 10 minutes or until it becomes smooth and elastic. This can also be done in the bowl if it’s comfortable to do so. A good way to check that you’ve kneaded enough is called the windowpane test, whereby you pinch of a small piece of dough and stretch it between your fingers. It should get thinner and thinner without tearing and you should see the shadow of your finger through it.

4- Put the dough in a large clean bowl, cover it and allow it to rise at room temperature for about 90 minutes or until almost doubled in size.

The dough should rise to almost twice the size. How quickly it rises depends on the temperature in your kitchen.

5- Turn the dough out onto a clean work surface and divide it into six equal pieces (about 140g each). Shape them into balls, cover them and allow them to rest for about 20 minutes as the oven heats.

Dough divided into six equal pieces

6- Turn your oven on to its maximum temperature with heat from top and bottom and place a baking stone, cast iron pan, an inverted large ceramic baking dish or a sheet pan in the center of the oven. The objective here is to create a very hot surface for the dough to be baked on so make sure you place it when the oven is cold so it’s fully heated.

7- Dust your work surface with wheat bran and start rolling a piece of dough on it so a lot of the wheat bran sticks to the bottom. Roll it out to about 20-25 cm in diameter and immediately transfer to the oven, directly on the hot surface.

Dough piece rolled out and ready to bake

8- Bake for about 3-5 minutes or until it puffs up and some brown spots start to appear. Remove and repeat with the remaining pieces. Stack the finished loaves on top of each other and cover with a clean towel until cooled down a bit.

Eish baladi done!