Lavash is a soft
and thin flatbread and is a part of every major meal in Armenia. It is also wildly popular in the Caucuses and
the Middle East. The ingredients are
simple and consisting of only flour, salt, and water. It’s then baked to a crisp and ready to serve
or it can be stored for a very long time.
It can then be moistened quickly and ready to serve once again. Most lavash is made in big bakeries with
modern cooking technology but I managed to find a place in my village that
still prepared lavash the old fashioned way: with a brick oven in the
ground.
I’ve eaten
flatbread before in Mediterranean and Middle Eastern restaurants before but
never realized how important a staple it was until I started living in
Armenia. I noticed that it was offered
at every meal and there were various ways to eat it. Eat lavash by itself, wrap lavash around some
cheese and vegetables, spread some homemade jam on it, bread wrapped in lavash,
and my favorite was wrapping lavash around some khorovats (Armenian BBQ).
I had seen
traditional lavash making on travel and food shows before and made every effort
to find it once I knew I would be living in a small village in Armenia. For weeks I asked my Language Instructors for
help finding a place in our village that did this. It wasn’t until the last week of living in my
village did I manage to see it being made.
The traditional
lavash bakery was less than a 5-minute walk from my host family’s house. The bakery was located in the back of
someone’s residence and consisted of two rooms.
The first was a mixing room where all the ingredients were put together
and stored until ready to be shaped and baked.
The second room consisted of a brick oven in the center of the room and
operated by a 3 station baking crew. The
baking crew was all women of various ages and had many decades of experience
between them. One of the quick
observations I first noticed was that they did all the preparations on the
brick floor. Each lady sits on a cushion
at their station, but upon closer look, there is a hole in the ground at each
station for their feet and comfort to maneuver around. The other thing I noticed was that when you
look at the walls you see they are layered in smoke. You don’t notice any smells except the warm
lavash cooling down too.
The first
station is located on the right hand side when you walk in and is operated by the
youngest of the ladies. Her name is
Nareene and it’s her job to get the pile of dough and roll it into a perfect
circle. She quickly rolls it out on her
rolling board and then throws it to the rolling board at the second
station. Dareeko, the oldest of the
three ladies is in her mid 70s, and at her station she takes the perfect circle
of flour and with just a simple wooden rod she rolls and shapes the perfect
circle into a long rectangular shape.
The final shape of the lavash is roughly 1.25 feet by 3.5 feet. From here, the wooden rod with the lavash on
it is handed to the third and final station.
Ano, has the most important job of the three, it’s up to Ano to place
the lavash in the oven and ensure it’s thoroughly baked with the right amount
of char on it.
When Ano
receives the lavash from Dareeko, she places it on this rectangular cushion and
stretches the lavash to make it fit accordingly. On the back of the cushion is a small handle
and it’s almost like holding a shield.
Dareeko then sprinkles some water on it and then leans over the brick
oven and sticks the lavash to the brick wall.
Slowly, you can see bubbles start to form on the lavash and within
minutes it is perfectly cooked and then she uses a medal rod with a hook at the
end to grab the lavash out of the brick oven then places it on the nearby
carpet to cool down. This process is repeated
over and over again.
The only time
for a break is when it’s time to reheat the brick oven. Bundles of dried branches are in the backyard
and brought inside. Slowly, the fire is
fed and it doesn’t take long for the entire room to fill up with smoke. There’s a tiny ventilation shaft in the
ceiling but it doesn’t seem to move out quickly enough. I can only handle being in there for a few
minutes before I have to take step outside.
I even offer to help tend to the oven too so the ladies can really enjoy
their coffee.
Depending on the
size of their order they can produce up to hundreds of lavash per day. Winter is the busiest time for them as there
are many celebrations taking place and most people prefer to have lavash made
the traditional way. The ladies are a
great joy to talk to and it’s such a pleasure to hear about their lives. The work is hard and even though I’ve just
spent a couple of hours with them, I can tell how much effort goes into
preparation. Their days begin very early
in the morning and the work is not finished until the orders are
completed. Happy travels.
