Lavash

One of the real pleasures of living in Armenia is the seemingly endless supply of the traditional Armenian flat bread, lavash. Lavash is baked in a very particular way, and it seems to require a 3-woman team to accomplish it.

The first woman forms the dough into balls and rolls them out into circular, flat shapes. The circular piece of dough is then tossed to the second woman who- in a move reminiscent of a stereotypical Italian pizza master- shapes the dough into an even larger, thinner disc by tossing it in the air and stretching it with her hands. Then she spreads the thin lavash dough over an oval shaped pillow-come-oven-mitt type device. 

At this point, we must digress from the lavash for a moment to discuss the traditional Armenian oven, in which all proper lavash is cooked. The oven is called a tonir, and it consists of a deep stone lined cylindrical pit. A fire is lit at the bottom and fed until the stone walls of the pit are baking hot. It is next to this fire-well that the women sit while shaping the lavash dough.

Now, let us return to the lavash. The second woman, who has just stretched the dough over a large pillow/oven mitt, uses this mitt to slap the moist lavash dough ontno the vertical side of the tonir, where it sticks to the hot stones. As the thin dough cooks, it dries, and falls away from the stones: a process that takes about 5 to 10 seconds. It is the job of a third woman with a metal hook on a long pole to reach into the pit and fish out the now cooked lavash. 

Almost as soon as she does, the second woman slaps the next piece of lavash against the wall of the tonir. A good lavash team is like a well-oiled machine, with almost no down-time for any of it's members. They will smile and chat with your without even breaking their rhythm. It's fascinating to watch. 

The freshly baked lavash is dry, and as it cools, it hardens into something like a giant, unsalted saltine, or a big piece of matza. I'm told that you can store dry lavash  like this for up to a year. 

The real magic of lavash comes when you want to eat it: you take these large, platter-sized crackers, liberally sprinkle them with water, and cover them with a cloth or towel. About 5 minutes later, the result is wonderfully soft, flexible flat bread, suitable for all type of rolls and wraps. I can highly recommend peanut butter and honey lavash wraps for breakfast, or, if peanut butter isn't available (because most of the time in Armenia it isn't), walnuts and honey makes a good substitute. Both are really enjoyable.