I mean to say that the Bread Baking Babes play with Persian Pebble Bread.
It’s baked on a bed of pebbles, which are small stones.
I’m not quite certain the size which determines the status of pebble versus stone, nor am I certain if it’s important.
Wait – it would be important to your dentist. The stones / pebbles should be removed before eating the bread. Smaller pebbles would be easier to miss.
I’m rambling…. much like the river that flowed over the rocks, smoothing the edges until they became pebbles suitable for the Babes.
Enough….
This is, according to Elizabeth, of blog from OUR kitchen and our host kitchen for this month, one of the favorite breads of Iran and eaten daily by most of the Iranians. It’s a flat bread – made with a soft dough cooked on hot stones.
It’s also one of the oldest flatbreads that has spread throughout the world.
She says it (pebble bread) can be found in Morocco. We had lots of wonderful flatbreads there but none looked as if it had been baked on stones.
I now have a mission (I need a mission): to go back to Marrakesh and find stone bread.
I’ll have to wait until after the pandemic, of course, but still…..
If you want to learn more about Persian Pebble Bread, aka: Naan Sangyak, as well as pebbles, stones and how to cook this on the barbecue grill, have a look at blog from Our kitchen. You’ll find the recipe, a bit of history, lots in instructional photos, and the details of baking along this month.
It’s a surprisingly easy bread and a lot of fun to make.
Provided you have the stones…..
And that’s it for the Babes in August…
Stay Safe, Healthy & Patient and wear your mask.
And enjoy your summer while you do all that….
And the Babes are:
The Bread Baking Babes
A Messy Kitchen – Kelly
Bake My Day – Karen
blog from OUR kitchen – Elizabeth
Bread Experience – Cathy
Feeding My Enthusiasms – Elle
Judy’s Gross Eats – Judy
Karen’s Kitchen Stories – Karen
My Diverse Kitchen — Aparna
My Kitchen In Half Cups – Tanna
Notitie Van Lien – Lien
And me…. Thyme for Cooking – Katie
I cannot believe that Tanna’s pebble bread disappeared after being on the internet for just one day. I also cannot believe that the modern Iranian bakeries cheat and cement their pebbles onto the floors of their ovens. Sheesh – it takes away from the fun of prizing the hot stones off the bottom of the bread!
According to one source (can I remember where I read it? Of course not!), pebble bread is made all over the Levant and the middle east. I must say that I’m a little surprised it isn’t baked this way world wide. It’s SUCH a cool method.
Ha. Perhaps the dentists of the western world have a strong lobby and have actively discouraged it…. 😉
I LOVE that one of the pebble bread bakeries in Morocco is at a gas station!
About a 20-minute cab ride from the Marrakesh medina, at the edge of the tony Palmeraie district, Al Baraka is part of a gas station. […] Bread is as essential to eating a tagine as rice is to sushi or a tortilla is to a taco. And here, the hubcap-size rounds of flat tafarnout semolina bread are stunningly good, baked to order by Berber women in wood-fired, pebble-floored clay oven. – Matthew Kronsberg, ‘A Tasting Tour of Marrakesh’, The Wall Street Journal, 3 January 2020 (https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-tasting-tour-of-marrakesh-11578066498)
Tanna’ missing post is a mystery…. And the pebble bread looks like a lot of fun to make and eat…. If you are careful. lol
Mow there will be 2 people looking for pebble bread in Morocco.
If you make sure that the pebbles aren’t too small, AND that the room is not dimly lit when you are removing the stones from the bottom of the bread, it is a lot of fun to make and eat.
We are reading “The Foods of Israel Today” by Joan Nathan, and just got to the section about visiting the small village of Nelli’im that overlooks the Judean Hills. I love the following description, proving that pebble bread is made in many places, not just Iran and Morocco:
“We drove up the sabra-lined road to Nelli’im, an Arab village on the way to Jerusalem […] [Ghada Kawaija] had just finished setting tiny okra to dry on a straw mat in the hot sun on her terrace overlooking the Judean Hills. […] As we spoke, she offered us a cold drink, a slice of whole-grain flatbread, a plate of sabras, and the most flavorful figs I have ever eaten. […] When we asked to see the oven in which she baked the bread, she led us to a vaulted stone room with a hole in he ceiling; on the floor beneath the flue, a fire had been built using charcoal, avocado wood, olive pits, and animal dung for kindling. The dough is baked on stones, which rest on the heated coals.” -Joan Nathan, ‘A Day in Nelli’im’, The Foods of Israel Today, p.100
I didnt encounter bread cooked on a bed of pebbles ever in 6 years….good reason to go back and try to find it
Meet you in Marrakesh and we’ll look together!
Yeah, I wonder what happened to Tanna’s post? Regardless, we can say that this bread “rocked” our taste buds!
I just checked – it’s still missing..,… Yes, the Babes Rocked!!!
Tanna’s post has reappeared! Yay! All those seeds that she added to the top of her pebble bread are so beautiful!
Got it! Mystery not solved but over…. Love the seeds!