Persian flatbread

Ingredients for 6 servings:

• 450 g flour
• 20 g yeast
• 1 tsp salt
• 50 g butter, soft
• 250 ml milk
• 1 egg yolk
• some cream
• 1 tbsp sesame seeds
• 1 tbsp caraway seeds (if you like them)
• Butter, for greasing the tray

Instructions

Working time approx. 1 hour; Rest time approx. 4 hours; Total time approx. 5 hours

Decorative bread for appetizers, grilling, snacking…

It takes a lot of time, with all the resting breaks, but always garners admiring glances from guests. Pour 100 ml of lukewarm water into a bowl, crumble in the yeast, mix in the salt and 1 tablespoon of flour, cover, and let rise in a warm place for 15 minutes. Stir in the butter and milk. Sift in about 2/3 of the remaining flour and mix in. Cover and let rise for 15 minutes. You can use the waiting time to make, for example, “Georgian Eggplant with Nuts.” Here at CK, in the cream version I commented on, it tastes excellent with this bread. The dough should now have roughly doubled in size; now it needs to be kneaded for 15 minutes, adding the remaining flour. I swear by hand for this; the dough simply turns out better than with a machine. Let it rest for another hour. Now it gets exciting: Preheat oven to 250°C (230°C fan-assisted oven), butter a baking sheet. Knead the dough again, divide into 6 pieces, shape into balls, and roll out with a rolling pin on a floured surface into a flatbread about 30 cm in diameter. Place the first flatbread on the baking sheet, possibly scoring it with a knife to create ornamental designs, then brush it with an egg yolk and cream mixture, sprinkle with sesame seeds and, if desired, caraway seeds, and place it on the top rack of the oven. Bake for about 3 minutes, then turn the flatbread over and bake for another 3 minutes. Be careful, as they burn quickly. Leftover flatbreads freeze well and only need to be reheated briefly.