Ψωμί κριθαρένιο. Πηγή: Στάλω Λαζάρου.
If a family had no wheat, it would use barley grains to make flour, which was then used to make bread.
Name - Recipe
Ψωμί κριθαρένιο.
Version A
750 g wheat flour
750 g barley flour
2 tablespoons sourdough starter
A pinch of salt
3-4 glasses lukewarm water
Version B
Flour as much as needed
Sourdough starter (the size of an orange)
2 jisve* hot water (80ml)
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon sugar
*jisve=jesve in Turkish = greek coffee pot= 40ml
Version A
Dissolve the starter with a little water in a basin. Add the flour, salt and a little bit of water, until the dough comes together. Take the dough, shape it and put it into the mould of the board (wooden board with molds) to take its shape. Leave it on the board for 30 minutes to proof, then put it in the oven for 1 hour. (Ourania Christodoulou, 72 years old, Kyperounda)
Version B
Arrange the flour on one side of the (rectangle) basin and the starter on the other side. Add the water, salt and sugar to the starter and dissolve it. Drag the flour from the other side of the basin, as much as needed, and begin to knead the dough until it is firm. Have a bowl with hot water to wet your hands and knead it again until it is soft. Add also a bit of hot water in the basin to soften the dough. Let the dough rest for 10 minutes. Then wet your hand and cut a piece of dough and put it on a floured board (a wooden board used to knead/shape the dough). Roll the dough on the flour until the dough is no longer sticky. Lift it up and turn it in between your hands to give it a nice round shape and flip it over the bread mould. Repeat the same process for as many loaves as you want (and according to how many can fit in the moulds of the board). Cover the loaves and let them proof. At this point, prepare the wood-fired oven so that it is ready to bake the loaves. When it is hot, place the coals aside and take a bucket of water and a piece of cloth wrapped around a piece of wood and wipe the oven until it is clean. In order to know when the temperature is right for baking, sprinkle inside some flour. If the flour burns then try again until the flour stays there and turns "red". Then take the mould board near the oven, put the loaves one by one onto the peel, score them all around, and put them into the wood-fired oven to bake. (Flourou K. Parpouna, 80 years old from Lysi)
Baking in the oven.
Today Flourou K. Parpouna is baking bread in a gas oven. The oven she uses is preheated for 15-20 minutes on high heat. She places the bread on parchment paper inside a baking tray and puts the bread in the oven. Twenty minutes later she puts a small bowl of water under the baking tray (at the bottom of the oven) to prevent the bottom of the bread from burning. Then, she lowers the oven temperature to half so that the beard browns on top. In about an hour the bread is ready. In the old days, when the loaves of bread were baked, they were left to cool for a while before placing them in woven baskets which were covered at the bottom with a piece of cloth. (Flourou K. Parpouna, 80 years old from Lysi)
Additional information and bibliography
Oral testimonies: Flourou K. Parpouna, 80 years old from Lysi. Recording: Christiana Parpouna, October 2010. Edited by Stalo Lazarou.
Ourania Christodoulou, 72 years old, Kyperounda (see Kourri, P. and Lazarou, S. (ed.) (2007). Traditional recipes of the village of Kyperounda, Unpublished data).
Christiana Parpouna, Stalo Lazarou
Κριθαρένιο ψωμί. Πηγή: Στάλω Λαζάρου.
Κριθαρένιο ψωμί. Πηγή: Στάλω Λαζάρου.
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