‘Samoon’ is broadly obtainable and cheap, and is eaten each at mealtimes and as a snack.
Baghdad, Iraq:
It’s ubiquitous in Iraq — a diamond-shaped bread often known as “samoon” which offers a cheap companion to nearly any meal served up on tables throughout the nation.
Abu Sajjad, a bakery proprietor in central Baghdad, stated he takes a recent batch out of the oven each 45 seconds.
The small, crunchy loaves can accompany dishes from meat to rice, and may be discovered on tables in even essentially the most far-flung villages.
Some Iraqis prefer to eat them on the go after cracking them open and including fillings like falafel and greens.
A part of their reputation lies of their simplicity — and affordability.
“I promote eight items of samoon for 1,000 dinars ($0.70),” stated 43-year-old Abu Sajjad, who has owned the bakery since 2005.
His son Sajjad, who’s in his twenties, mixes flour, yeast and water, and typically a pinch of salt, then lets a machine knead the dough for 10 minutes.
After letting it relaxation, he shapes lumps of dough into diamond-shaped loaves that depart his brick oven with a crunchy crust on the surface and steaming sizzling on the within.
The bakery sells 10,000 samoon items “on a traditional day”, whereas on Fridays, the Islamic day of relaxation, “we are able to go as much as 12,000”, Sajjad, the son, stated.
Their busy store sits on Baghdad’s Al-Rashid Road amongst dilapidated nineteenth century homes, whereas a bunch of eating places make up their essential clients.
Latest commodity worth hikes have seen the price of flour imported from Turkey enhance.
However Abu Sajjad stated he had “lowered the load of every samoon from 120 to 100 grammes” as a substitute of elevating costs.
Based on writer Nawal Nasrallah, the title samoon got here from a Turkish time period whose roots derive from the Greek phrase for bread.
Whereas noting doable earlier variations of the loaves, she stated “evidently the diamond form was developed by the early twentieth century Iraqi bakers”, writing in her cookbook and historical past of Iraqi delicacies, “Delights from the Backyard of Eden”.
With lunchtime quick approaching, Karim, a daily buyer on the bakery, was amongst these stocking up.
“We Iraqis love samoon. We have been born with it, we’re used to it — and we prefer it sizzling,” the 41-year-old stated whereas biting right into a freshly baked loaf.
(Apart from the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV workers and is printed from a syndicated feed.)
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