IT'S LOVELY LAVASH--BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE DARING BAKERS

This month's Daring Bakers' challenge was a far cry from last month's eclairs, but I'm certain I'll be making lavash again. Lavash is an Armenian-style cracker similar to other middle eastern and northern African flatbreads such as mankoush, pita, and kesret. The primary difference among these flatbreads is either how thick or thin they are rolled out or the type of oven in which they are baked. Our challenge was to make lavash and a vegan dip or topping or salsa or spread to serve with it.

I've been playing around with bread baking, so I had all the supplies on hand. Better results are had by weighing the flour instead of measuring it.

To make 1 sheet of crackers:

1 1/2 cups (6.75 oz) unbleached bread flour

1/2 tsp salt (.13 oz)

1/2 tsp instant yeast (.055 oz)

1 tbs sugar (.75 oz)

1 tbs vegetable oil (.5 oz)

1/2 cup + 2 tbs water, at room temperature

OPTIONAL: poppy seeds, sesame seeds, caraway seeds, kosher salt, cinnamon and sugar

PROCEDURE:

In a mixing bowl, stir together the flour, salt, yeast, sugar, oil, and enough of the water to bring everything together in a ball (I used all the water).

Sprinkle some flour on your surface and knead the dough for at least 10 minutes, until the ingredients are evenly distributed.

The dough should pass the windowpane test (see http://www.wikihow.com/Determine-if-Bre...ong-Enough) for a full explanation of this.

Lightly oil a bowl and transfer the dough to the bowl, rolling it around to coat it with oil. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let it ferment for 90 minutes.

Mist the surface lightly with nonstick spray and press the dough into a square with your hand. Dust the top of the dough lightly with flour, then roll it out with a rolling pin into a paper thin sheet about 15 X 12. Cover it with a towel and let it rest for 5 minutes. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper and preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Sprinkle the top of your dough with desired seeds or toppings and lightly press in with the rolling pin.

Carefully lift the sheet of dough to the parchment lined sheet. If you wish to precut the cracker, use a pizza cutter to do so. You need not separate the pieces now; they will snap apart after baking. Mist with water. Bake for 15-20 minutes until the crackers have begun to evenly brown across the top. Cool in the pan 10 minutes.

To serve with the lavash, I used my recipe for hummus (see earlier post at left) to which I added the cloves of 1 head of roasted garlic and 1 roasted red pepper. The results were delicious.