Kahi

Ingredients

Dough

• 400 gplain flour
• 1 tspsalt
• 250 mlwarm water
• oil, for stretching

To layer

• 200 gghee, melted

Syrup

• 300 gsugar
• 150 mlwater
• 1 tsplemon juice
• 1 tsprose water
• 3cardamom pods

To serve

• geymar or clotted cream
• date syrup
• sweet tea

Directions

1. Make a soft dough with the flour, salt and warm water, knead it 10 minutes, and rest it under oil for at least an hour.
2. Resting under oil rather than under a cloth is what lets the dough stretch without tearing later.
3. Boil the syrup ingredients for 5 minutes, then cool it. It should be thin, not thick.
4. Keep the syrup thin. Kahi is drenched rather than glazed, and thick syrup sits on the surface and makes it cloying.
5. Oil a large surface generously and take a ball of dough about the size of an egg.
6. Flatten it, then stretch it outward with oiled palms until it is a huge, almost transparent sheet.
7. Stretch it until you can read through it. The layers are the whole dish, and a thick sheet gives you fried bread.
8. Brush the sheet all over with melted ghee.
9. Fold the sheet into a long strip, brushing with ghee again, then fold that strip into a square packet of four or five layers.
10. Brush ghee between every fold without exception. It is what keeps the layers separate, and a dry fold fuses them into one solid mass.
11. Rest the folded squares 15 minutes.
12. Heat a heavy flat griddle over a medium heat with a film of ghee.
13. Cook the squares for 3 to 4 minutes a side, pressing them flat with a spatula, adding more ghee as it is absorbed.
14. They are ready when deeply golden, blistered and audibly crisp, with the layers visibly separated at the edges.
15. Pour the cool syrup over them the moment they come off the griddle.
16. Hot pastry into cool syrup, which is what drives it into the layers. Both hot and it slides off; both cold and nothing absorbs.
17. Serve immediately with a heavy spoonful of geymar on top and date syrup alongside.
18. It is Baghdad breakfast, eaten early with geymar and sweet tea, and the specialist kahi shops open before dawn.

Technique

• Geymar is Iraqi buffalo clotted cream and it is not optional in the traditional service.
• It has to be eaten within minutes, which is why it is a shop breakfast rather than a home one.
• The stretching takes practice and the first few sheets will tear.

Substitutions

• Clotted cream or thick mascarpone in place of geymar.
• Filo pastry brushed with ghee, which is a shortcut and gives a different texture.

Variations

• Served with date syrup instead of sugar syrup.
• Without syrup at all, as a plain layered bread.
• With a dusting of ground pistachio.

History

Flaky layered pastry brushed with butter and eaten hot with geymar cream and syrup at breakfast.

Frequently asked questions

What is Kahi?

Kahi is a breakfast from Iraq: crisp layered pastry drenched in syrup, topped with geymar. Flaky layered pastry brushed with butter and eaten hot with geymar cream and syrup at breakfast.

How long does Kahi take to make?

Kahi takes 30 min plus resting of preparation and 20 min of cooking. The recipe makes 6 servings. It is rated hard to make.

What can I substitute in Kahi?

Yes, within limits. Clotted cream or thick mascarpone in place of geymar. Filo pastry brushed with ghee, which is a shortcut and gives a different texture.

What is the most important thing to get right in Kahi?

Resting under oil rather than under a cloth is what lets the dough stretch without tearing later.