By David Mac Dougall

One of the most wonderful things in Iraq is their bread. I admit, I’m a carboholic. There’s two main types. One is called “samoon.” It’s shaped like a football, thick and soft and doughy. The snag with samoon is, it’s only good hot. Once it goes cold it tastes like cardboard. Many people like to cut the samoon open and fill it with cheese or vegetables or meat (it’s hollow inside, like a pita pocket).

The other type of bread is called “khoboz”. It’s flat un-leven bread (like a giant Mexican tortilla or Greek gyro). This type of bread is good spread with humous, piled with grilled chicken and sweet purple onions, then rolled up.

The samoon bread is baked in a kiln. The baker puts a row of un-baked dough onto a long thing paddle… which he slides into the oven (which looks sort of like a pizza oven). The khoboz bread is baked in a traditional tanoor oven - slapped on the side, it’s super heated and very soft when it comes out.

Here’s some video of two women bakers in our neighborhood: they bake khoboz bread, wholemeal and rustic. It’s delicious, and we buy some every day.

Here’s another video of bakers in Mosul & Baghdad baking khoboz and samoon, so you can see the process.