The Breads of Egypt: Bakakeen - البكاكين

One of the most common social habits in Egypt is to bring something with you when going to visit people; in many cases, people bring something sweet. While your aunt or uncle whom you see regularly might walk into the door with some fruit, one day my friend Ahmed El-Deeb saw fit to drop by with an assortment of bread. One of the types he brought was this bakakeen bread, also known as komag in his hometown of Mansoura.

Bakakeen (البكاكين), which is also known as komag (كوماج) across the Nile Delta region in the north of Egypt, is a pocket-style bread that’s made with buttermilk instead of water and is enriched with some type of fat, either oil or melted butter. It is typically eaten for breakfast with some soft white cheese or jam though more adventurous sandwich options can be nice as well.

As to the different names, I chose the name Bakakeen based on two reason. Firstly, it seems to be the more common name used in Egyptian content based on my search. Secondly, searching for the Arabic term “كوماج“, you would end up around Moroccan beauty salons learning about a French exfoliation method known as “Gommage”. This is another curious case of different pronunciations of the same letter where the Arabic letter “ج“ is pronounced like a hard g in Egypt and a soft g in Morocco. Therefore, the choice of name for this bread is Bakakeen mainly to distinguish the content online.

This is the second recipe to feature buttermilk instead of water as the main ingredient (see the Qoras recipe). Traditional recipes will begin by mixing the flour with the liquid fat first then add the buttermilk. I’ve found in my testing that this produces a crumbly loaf of bread that lacks the strength needed for pleasant pocket breads. Changing the order on the other hand produced a sturdier loaf that would open up nicely and not crumble easily. This is the same idea that was used in the Fino recipe.

Loaves opened nicely in the oven

The overall method is almost the same as the eish baladi recipe but with the addition of oil and doesn’t use any wheat bran. To allow the dough to open up quickly, the dough needs to be baked directly on a hot surface. You can place the rolled pieces on parchment paper which you keep on a large tray and have another tray heating up in the oven. When it’s time to bake, slide the parchment paper from one tray to another so the dough hits the hot surface immediately. So if you’ve done the Qoras recipe and have some buttermilk left over, or you’re curious about a simple and flavourful pocket-style bread, this recipe could be the one for you.

Ingredients:

500 grams flour

10 grams salt

3 teaspoons yeast

350 grams buttermilk

50 grams oil (sunflower, canola, rapeseed, corn or any neutral oil)

Time needed: 2 hours
Mixing and kneading: 10 minutes

Rising time: 1 hour, 30 minutes

Baking: 10 minutes

Steps:

1- In a large bowl, add the flour, salt and yeast. Mix well then add the buttermilk. Mix the buttermilk with the dry ingredients until a smooth dough forms, then knead for five to ten minutes until the dough becomes elastic and doesn’t tear easily when stretched.

2- Add the oil and mix it thoroughly into the dough. It will look like it’s not mixing at first but keep going until you don’t see the oil separate from the dough.

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

4- Divide the risen dough into eight equal pieces around 110-120 grams each. Cover them and allow them to rest for about ten minutes before rolling.

5- Preheat your oven to 240 degrees C (or as high as it can go) and place a baking tray in the middle to get really hot. Meanwhile have another tray ready, upside down, lined with a sheet of parchment paper.

6- Lightly dust your work surface with flour and start rolling out the pieces into discs about 20 cm in diameter. Place four rolled pieces onto the parchment paper.

Rolled pieces placed on parchment paper on an upside down tray

7- Carefully slide the parchment paper onto the hot tray in the oven and bake for three to five minutes, or until the bread puffs up and is lightly browned on top. Repeat with the remaining four pieces.

Bakakeen finished