We're going to divide this dough in half,
and we're going to use the tool that the Persian soldiers would
have had.
OK.
Hey there I'm Sohla El-Wayily, and this is
"Ancient Recipes with Sohla."
In each episode, we're going to take a dish you may recognize,
and attempt to recreate one of the boldest versions of it
to ever exist.
It's a little history, it's a little cooking,
and it's a whole lot of me.
What's not to love?
Uh, so, in this episode, we're going
to try and make one of the oldest versions of pizza
to ever exist.
Now, I know modern day pizza have
its origins based in Italy.
But the history of pizza goes back much further than that.
I mean, if you start to break it down,
pizza really is just a type of flatbread, right?
And many cultures throughout history
have had their own type of flatbread pizza,
long before the cheesy, saucy version we've
all come to know and love.
So there are a lot of potential origins for today's pizza--
but to be honest, it's most likely a mix
of multiple different recipes.
But one of the coolest versions was made by Persian soldiers
on their shields.
[MEN YELLING, SWORDS CLASHING]
Yeah, on their shields!
So we're going to try and take this shield,
to try and recreate that ancient pizza.
I've never cooked on a shield so--
here goes nothing!
OK, today we're going to be making a
traditional Persian flatbread--
Nan-e Barbari-- using ingredients
that would be available to the Persian soldiers
back in 6th century BCE.
Now maybe-- maybe they would have mixed
it in a helmet like this--
but, you know, they could have also mixed in a bowl.
So we're going to go with a bowl,
and we're going to top it with their favorite
ingredients, dates and cheese.
So for the dough, I've got whole wheat flour.
I'm going to mix that up with some salt and beer yeast.
Now, they wouldn't have had the kind of commercial yeast
that we have today, but they definitely would have used
something like a beer yeast.
Apparently the Sumerians were a big fan of beer.
Or, more likely, a lump of old sourdough, or maybe
like a sourdough starter.
But the beer yeast is definitely something that they had around.
So I'm just mixing that together, we're just
kind of whis-- whisking it up.
And then I'm going to add in the water,
and we're going to knead.
OK, so I'm going to do like a--
a pour-- for-- finger with-- you know?
Finger whisk, it's very useful.
There we go.
This water is just a little bit warm, which is going to help,
you know, get that beer yeast doing it's thing.
I can already smell, it smells like beer.
So I think this bread's going to have
a really interesting flavor.
I've never used beer yeast before,
so I'm really interested to see what this tastes like.
And whole wheat flour is a little bit
thirstier than all-purpose, so we've got a good bit of water
in here.
OK, so this is coming together into really nice dough.
Once everything is, like, moist-- mostly moistened,
we're going to switch to a kneading.
I have this little bit of dry bits of flour,
and you could just use your dough to kind of scrape it up,
make sure you get all of it.
It feels really sticky now, but it's going
to get smoother as I knead.
So I'm not going to freak out and add flour,
but I have it on standby.
The thing with making bread is there's always recipes, but--
you-- if it's just, like, a humid day,
you're going to need less water.
If it's really dry, you might need more water.
So recipes for bread are just like a starting point,
and it's good to make it a few times,
so you can get the feel of what the dough is
supposed to be like.
This is feeling pretty dry, so I'm
going to add just a little sprinkle,
a little sprinkle of flour.
Rain it down from the heavens.
OK.
Now I'm getting in there.
Kneading bread is hard in a kitchen,
so it must have been pretty difficult for the soldiers
to do it like--
I don't know, outside in a camp.
Soldiers--
[GRUNT]
--making bread.
You got to eat.
You need fuel, you know, for the fight.
[HORSES WHINNYING]
This is a pretty tight dough, and that's because
of the whole wheat flour.
I think we got this, I think we're doing it.
Kneading the dough until it's nice and smooth
is going to make sure we develop enough gluten,
so we getting, like, nice air pockets and bubbles.
Like, you need gluten--
you need gluten to develop in your bread
so that when your yeast burps and bubbles,
it can hold on to those bubbles.
OK, look at how smooth our dough's become!
Wow.
I was just so busy telling you all these bread facts,
it just came together.
OK, now we have achieved nice, smooth dough development.
Now--
[GRUNT]
We're not going to ignore this shield.
Because I can.
So we're going to proof it on the shield.
I'm just going to oil it up so it doesn't stick.
Just a little bit of olive oil.
Rub it down.
I'm going to be generous.
I spent some time kneading that dough by hand, you know?
I don't want to lose it to the shield.
And now I'm going to just pop it on here, cover it,
and we're going to let it proof for an hour.
And then we're going to form it.
[HARP MUSIC]
[LAUGHS]
Was that OK?
OK, all right.
So our dough has been proofing for an hour,
and now we're going to portion it.
So you can see this-- it's gotten a little bit of poof.
It's not going to go crazy because it's not
commercial yeast, but there's a little bit of volume,
and I can just feel that it's a little bit spongy.
We know that there's a good bit of air in there.
So before we get going, I'm going
to lightly dust the surface.
A little bit of flour.
And we're going to divide this dough in half.
And we're going to use the tool that the Persian soldiers would
have had.
OK.
[DRAMATIC MUSIC]
[LAUGHS] OK.
So we're going to divide this in half.
So we're going to have two flat breads.
[DRAMATIC MUSIC SWELLS]
So authentic.
Sword is the way to go here.
And I'm just going to gently deflate each piece,
and form it into roughly 9 inches long and about,
like, five or six inches wide.
Kind of like a ciabatta.
We're going wide, flat.
So I'm just going to stretch it out with my hands.
Nothing too, like, crazy or precise.
They probably didn't have a rolling pin,
so fingies are the best tool next to a sword.
After a sword.
Sword is the best tool.
I-- They probably don't have a ruler, either,
so I'm going to just, like, eyeball
what 9 inches feels to me.
You know?
And then this is going to proof again.
We're going to cover this up and let it rise.
I feel like that's-- that feels good.
It's about 9 inches.
It's about 9 inches long, about six inches wide.
It's not perfect, but we're using our hands.
And now I'm going to cover this and let it
proof for another half an hour.
Now I'm going to head on over to the stove,
and we're going to make the glaze.
It's called romali.
And what it does is, it's going to make the crust really shiny,
but also, it's a really clever way to add
some moisture to the dough.
A lot of modern bread ovens inject steam into it
so you get a really good pouf.
We're used to poofy bread these days.
But back then, when you didn't have those things,
you had to figure out ways to add moisture to the bread
so that it could rise before setting.
And you get more-- you get more fluff city.
All right, so the soldiers would have probably built a fire--
[WAR NOISES]
--and then cooked the pizza--
the flat bread-- right on top of that fire.
But for safety reasons, we're going to do an oven,
so I'm going to preheat my shield in a hot oven
to get us started.
So I'm going to mix this up, and we're
going to simmer it until it just thickens
and coats the back of a spoon.
And right now, our shield is just preheating.
So it's going to be kind of like-- hopefully
like a pizza stone.
So as soon as we pop it on there,
we're going to get a nice little poof.
When you're cooking bread, it's all about that initial poof,
because after the bread has been in the oven for a few minutes,
the crust starts to set, so you're not going to--
it'll stop-- it'll stop poofing.
You know?
So you need to--
do everything possible to get that-- a good initial poof.
So preheating your pizza stone-- or in this case, a shield--
adding some moisture-- in this case,
we're going to use this glaze, romali, but I've seen people,
like, throw ice cubes into an oven,
or have a pot of steaming water underneath.
All of that's just to make sure you can get that initial rise.
Oven spring.
So some modern glazes, they put a little sugar in there.
But back then, they wouldn't have had that shug.
So we're going to try and keep it as tradition as possible.
And it's already kind of thickening up.
That's cool, right?
Pretty much as soon as it boiled,
it thickened, and I feel like that is good to go.
So I'm going to turn this off.
So by now, our shield is preheated.
I'm going to let this cool just a touch so I can handle it.
After forming-- this has proofed for another 30 minutes.
It doesn't look like a lot happened, because we're using
beer yeast instead of commercial yeast,
but we've got a little bit of leaven--
like a little bit of fluff city happening.
And they would divide the dough kind of into five sections.
I'm gonna just use my finger to put these indentations.
And then I'm going to spread on the glaze.
Then we're going to throw it on top of that shield.
OK, I'm going to start by baking just one piece.
So I'm going to keep this guy covered so it doesn't dry out.
And now, here I'm going to--
gonna just try and smooth on a thin layer of this glaze.
I doubt they would have had a brush.
If this was cool, you can, like-- you could probably
rub it on with your hands.
But we just need a thin layer.
It's going to bake up really nice
and shiny, add some moisture.
I mean, it looks nothing like the pizza I know.
My favorite kind of pizza is New York style.
But lately I've been, like--
I've kind of been craving deep dish,
even though I don't like it.
I don't know.
The other night, I watched a bunch of YouTube videos
on deep dish pizza, and every single one,
I'm like-- this is terrible.
But for some reason, I really want to make it.
That would be the opposite of this.
This is definitely not a deep dish.
When it comes to, like, glazing things, like egg wash,
frosting a cake--
stuff like that, when you're smoothing
something on to something--
I could totally zone out and do it for hours.
Like, people have had to take cakes away from me
because I just kept frosting.
I feel like this is one of those things
where they're going to have to be like, that's enough glaze.
Let's move on.
Every nook and cranny.
It's going to be worth it, it's going to be shiny,
it's going to have a nice oven spring.
OK, I'm done.
OK.
So now I'm going to quickly transfer
this onto my preheated shield.
And we're going to bake this for about--
it's going to bake for a total of 15 minutes,
but halfway through, we're going to get in there
and give it a flip, and then add our toppings.
Otherwise, it is not a pizza.
OK.
All right, I'll be back in a few.
So our pizza's baked for about eight minutes.
So it's halfway baked.
I'm going to flip it over and add the toppings, which
is the most important part.
It's not a pizza without toppings.
I'm going to start with some dates.
Now, uh-- at first, pizza was actually
considered low class food.
A lot of the judge-y Italian critics
thought it was disgusting.
But then in 1885--
well, I don't remember the year.
But then Queen Margherita visited Naples,
and the rumor was that she was sick of eating her royal diet
and wanted to try some of the food of the people.
And then she tried a pizza with tomatoes,
mozzarella, and basil.
And it was her favorite, and that's-- they say--
they say that's where the Margherita pizza comes from.
So I'm just ripping these up with my hands
because I feel like that's what they would have done.
You know?
No one's dicing up dates back then.
This is going to add some nice, chewy sweetness.
And now for the cheese--
we're going to use halloumi.
Now, they wouldn't have had this exact cheese back then.
But this is a descendant of many Middle Eastern cheeses.
So we're close.
We're in the ballpark.
They probably would have had something like feta as well,
but that's not as melty.
We wanted to go for the halloumi because it's going to give
us a little bit of melt--
feel a little bit like the pizza we know today.
After I top this with cheese, it's
going to go back in the oven for about another eight minutes,
and then it's ready to go.
Ready to eat.
It doesn't look like a pizza I know, but I have a feeling--
bread and cheese, you can never go wrong.
So-- back in the oven.
All right.
Now it's time to taste the pizza.
They look fantastic.
I'm going to go for this cheesy one.
This extra cheesy guy.
This is what I'm doing.
OK.
Bread looks dense, but let's see how it tastes.
First thought-- this is a pretty dense dough
compared to pizza today, but it has a lot of flavor.
It's really, really nutty, and that
goes really well with the sweet dates and the salty cheese.
There's a lot going on.
Yeah, I'm getting a lot of that wheat-y flavor.
Nice cheese.
Nice saltiness from the cheese-- it's a little bit
squeaky, which I'm super into.
And the dates got a little char in the oven,
so they're a little bit caramelized.
They're really sticky from warming up.
And, um-- I don't know, I think it's--
I think it's tasty.
I think this is something that you should go make.
Go make this exactly like this.
You don't have to cook on a shield.
Although cooking on the shield was not that difficult.
It's really a lot like using a baking sheet.
I can totally see how this makes a great thing to cook on.
But I would actually make this again,
probably exactly the same.
It is a dense dough, but there is so much flavor,
and it goes really well with the dates and the cheese.
I mean, all pizza's good.
It doesn't matter if it's ancient pizza or modern pizza--
all pizza's good.
It's cheese and bread.
Mm-hmm.
This will fill you up, fuel you ready for battle.
I hope you like watching me make ancient pizza.
And if you're into it, subscribe.
Hit us up in the comments if there's any ancient recipes
you want me to try, and I'll see you next time!