Lahmacun (Middle Eastern Pizza) - Vegetarian
Lahmacun, lahmajoun or lahm bi-`ajĩn is a personal, very thin crust, minced meat pizza. It is a common dish in Middle East, Anatolia and Caucasus regions. In countries like Turkey, Armenia, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, or Iran, there are bakeries that cater only lahmacun. In Western countries, some Arabic, Kurdish, Armenian, or Turkish restaurants serves lahmacun as a side dish.
As the Arabic name suggest (lahm bi-`ajĩn - meat with dough), it is not a vegetarian dish, but since I try keep away from meat in my daily life, I replaced the minced meat with ground meat alternative. The taste was same.
For the dough I used the same recipe as Turkish pide, from Home Baking.
Ingredients:
Dough
1 tsp active dry yeast
2 cups of warm water
1 cup of wheat flour
5 cups of all purpose flour
1.5 tsp salt
1 tbsp olive oil
Filling
2 medium size onions (diced)
2 tbsp cooking oil
1 tbsp tomato paste
1-2 tsp salt
0.5 tsp sugar
200g ground soy meat
1-2 tbsp water
2 tbsp of minced parsley
Spices (black pepper is a must)
1. Dissolve the yeast in a large bowl.
2. Add wheat flour and one cup of all purpose flour, and stir.
3. Cover the mixture and put aside for 10 minutes, up to 3 hours.
4. Add oil and salt.
5. Slowly add the remaining flour until it is hard to stir.
6. Turn the dough over the slightly floured surface, and knead it for 6-8 minutes. The dough should not stick to your hands while you are kneeding. If necessary add more flour.
7. Cover the dough with a plastic film and put it aside for 1.5-2 hours, until the dough doubles its initial size.+
8. In a pan sautee the onion in oil with sugar and salt.
9. Add soy meat and water.
10. Remove the mixture from the heat and add parsley and spices. Let it cool down.
11. When the dough is ready, turn the dough over the slightly floured surface
12. Slice the dough into 10 slices and make balls. Cover the pieces with a damp cloth.
13. Take the first piece and flat the dough into a circle (D=6-9 in.) with using a rolling pin. The thickness of the dough should be a little less than 1/4th of an inch (less than 1/2 cm)
14. Brush the surface with olive oil.
15. Sprinkle 1-2 tbsp stuffing onto the dough. Press them down a little, since the stuffing has to stick to the surface.
16. Brush the sides with olive oil again.
17. Put the pide on preheated skillet and cook the bottom at medium temperature.
18. Once the bottom is cooked, transfer the pide to an oven dish and place it to the oven which is set to broil.
19. Cook the top until the surface turn to light brown-golden.
* If you are trying this for the first time, you should prepare one pide at a time.
+If you do not have about 2 hours, you can heat the oven a little less than 150F/70C, and keep the dough covered with moist towel in the oven. Just make sure that the oven is only warm and the cloth is not touching the dough.
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