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Kesra

Le tour du monde en 80 pains | kesra

Form: Flattened round loaf

Country of origin: Morocco

What distinguishes it from other methods of bread making: Made using hard wheat and leaven (sourdough starter)

Category of bread: (2) In the family of countless flat breads, the Moroccan sourdough kesra is undoubtedly the noblest of all

Particularity: Made at home, but cooked in the bread baker’s oven

Ingredients: Fine semolina; leaven or baker’s yeast; oil; salt; warm water

Le tour du monde en 80 pains | Morocco

Morocco

Moroccan women often use the large couscous dish to prepare the dough for kesras. The preparation, consisting of hard wheat, salt and water, is then sprinkled with leaven made from what was left of the dough from the last kneading. The bread is then put onto small boards covered with cloth and left to rise until it is time to take them to the baker for cooking. The Moroccan kesra distinguishes itself from the Algerian kesra, which is cooked in a cone-shaped tajine pot, made of heavy clay, and often painted or glazed.

The ritual for cooking bread is extremely codified. It is most often children who carry the small boards holding the risen kesras to the baker, with their “cargo” balanced on their heads. The baker of course has an oven that he offers for use by the community in return for payment in kind, for example a share of the batch of bread. It is not uncommon to see children converging around the neighborhood oven in the morning, and to miraculously succeed in taking home the bread without any disasters.

The baker often has to manage a large number of breads coming from different houses. There are times when there are true “traffic jams” around his oven. So as not to risk mixing up all these different breads, he uses a knife to mark them, so he can identify them when they are taken out of the oven. He then distributes them among the various children waiting to head home with them.