Ethiopian bread is a sweet and savory vegan bread, packed with delicate aroma of ground ginger and cardamom. It pairs really well with hot chai-tea latte or cup of coffee.
As you all know, I love baking breads and I post a bread recipe every Wednesday. Today, I am presenting my take on the traditional Ethiopian bread, also known as Himbasha or Ambasha - Ethiopian / Eritrean Celebration Bread. I learnt about this bread while reading an article on popular breads from across the world.
What is Ethiopian bread made of?
The two unique ingredients that go into its making are cardamom powder (ground cardamom seeds) and dry ginger powder. My husband loves the flavor of cardamom in desserts, and ginger is his all-time favorite ingredient. His love for ginger is so much that I maintain fresh stock of dry ginger root, dry ginger powder, fresh ginger root, ginger-flavored sugar crystals, homemade ginger-pepper throat drops (only to name a few) in my pantry.
He starts his day with a tall glass of freshly squeezed lemon juice with grated ginger, and almost always ends his day with hot ginger tea. Therefore, I knew deep within that he would be thrilled if I prepared this bread that calls for two of his favorite ingredients! I gave it a shot, and surprised him by the time he was back from the office. He not only loved it, he gobbled up an entire skillet-sized bread in no time.
The recipe calls for very basic ingredients from your kitchen. So making the dough is super easy. You can get as creative as you can as far as decorating this bread goes. I am not a good artist, but I tried my level best to score patterns into this bread as per the traditional recipe 🙂 You can also check more details about this bread on Wikipedia (Himbasha). If you guys try this bread do share your pictures and variations.
Detailed recipe for Ethiopian Bread - traditional Ethiopian bread, also known as Himbasha or Ambasha - Ethiopian / Eritrean Celebration Bread.
Recipe card
Ethiopian Bread | Himbasha , Ambasha , H'mbasha | Traditional Ethiopian / Eritrean Celebration Bread
Ingredients
- 2 ¼ teaspoon Active dry yeast 1 packet
- 1 cup Water warm
- ¼ cup Sugar plus an additional 1 tsp
- 1 teaspoon Salt
- 1 teaspoon Dry ginger powder
- 1 teaspoon Cardamom powder
- 2 ¾ cup to 3 cups All purpose flour
- ¼ cup Semolina optional, check tips
- Butter or Olive oil - to brush, grease the pan and coat the dough.
Instructions
Step I
- In a large bowl, add warm water and 1 teaspoon of sugar. Sprinkle yeast.1 cup Water, ¼ cup Sugar, 2 ¼ teaspoon Active dry yeast
- Cover it and leave it undisturbed for 10 minutes. Let the yeast activate.
Step II
- To the yeast mixture, add ¼ cup sugar, salt, ground cardamom, ginger, flour and semolina and mix to form this dough.¼ cup Sugar, 1 teaspoon Salt, 1 teaspoon Dry ginger powder, 1 teaspoon Cardamom powder, 2 ¾ cup to 3 cups All purpose flour , ¼ cup Semolina
- Dust the working surface. Transfer the dough and knead it for at least 5 minutes to form a soft and smooth dough.
- Coat the bowl with oil. Place the dough. Cover and keep it in warm place for 1 hour or until doubled in size.Butter
Step III
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Divide the dough into two equal portions. Roll it to the size of your skillet pan or two circles of 10-inch diameter.
- Place the rolled dough onto the two greased skillet pans or greased baking pan. Using a knife or a blade, score 3 to 4 cuts across the rolled dough, intersecting through the center. Then draw concentric circles to form a wheel pattern.
- Brush with generous amount of butter or oil.Butter
- Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes or until it is golden in color.
- Ethiopian Bread is now ready. Serve with additional butter if desired and enjoy.
Notes
- You can also add in ¼ cup of butter or olive oil to the dough if desired to make it more rich. I have tried adding oil and it tastes good too. In this case amount of flour needed may slightly vary.
- I have added ¼ cup of semolina thus 2 ¾ cup of flour was sufficient. If you skip semolina adjust flour accordingly. I have added semolina mainly for texture.
- Again the amount of flour may vary depending on the weather conditions and the brand of flour used.
- This is a light version of bread. If you like the strong flavors then vary the amount of cardamom, ginger.
- I have used this pan only for presentation. Please use oven safe dish or cast iron pan for baking.
Nutrition
If you like this Ethiopian bread,
Don't miss to check out Vienna bread which garnered more than a million page views, and other delicious bread and flatbread recipes.
|
|
|
|
|
|
***Click below to save it on Pinterest***
Preparation time : 1 hour 30 minutes
Serves : 2 small skillet breads (10" diameter)
Ingredients for Ethiopian Bread
Active dry yeast - 1 packet ( 2 ¼ tsp)
Warm water - 1 cup
Sugar - ¼ cup + 1 tsp
Salt - 1 tsp
Ground dry ginger powder - 1 tsp
Ground cardamom - 1 tsp
All purpose flour - 2 ¾ cup to 3 cups
Semolina - ¼ cup (optional), for more details check the tip section.
Butter / Vegetable oil / Olive oil - to brush, grease the pan and coat the dough.
Steps to prepare Ethiopian Bread
Step I
- In a large bowl, add warm water and 1 teaspoon of sugar. Sprinkle yeast.
- Cover it and leave it undisturbed for 10 minutes. Let the yeast activate.
Step II
- To the yeast mixture, add sugar, salt, ground cardamom, ginger, flour and semolina and mix to form this dough.
- Dust the working surface. Transfer the dough and knead it for at least 5 minutes to form a soft and smooth dough.
- Coat the bowl with oil. Place the dough. Cover and keep it in a warm place for 1 hour or until doubled in size.
Step III
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Divide the dough into two equal portions. Roll it to the size of your skillet pan or two circles of 10 " diameter and place it on the baking pan.
- Place the rolled dough onto the two greased skillet pans. Using a knife or a blade, score 3 to 4 cuts across the rolled dough, intersecting through the center. Then draw concentric circles to form a wheel pattern.
- Brush with a generous amount of butter or oil.
- Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes or until it is golden in color.
- Ethiopian Bread is now ready. Serve with additional butter if desired and enjoy.
Tips to make Ethiopian bread:
- You can also add in ¼ cup of butter or olive oil to the dough if desired to make it richer. I have tried adding oil and it tastes good too.
- I have added ¼ cup of semolina thus 2 ¾ cup of flour was sufficient. If you skip semolina, adjust the flour accordingly. I have added semolina mainly for texture.
- Again the amount of flour may vary depending on the weather conditions and the brand of flour used.
- This is a light version of bread. If you like the strong flavors, then vary the amount of cardamom and ginger.
- I have used this pan only for presentation. Please use an oven-safe dish or cast iron pan for baking.
Rahul @samosastreet.com says
There is an Ethiopian restaurant close to my house and I just love there food, especially the injera which is similar to our dosa, but newer had/saw this bread there.
Kushi your bread looks perfect, loved the addition of ginger and cardamom powder
Kushi says
That sounds interesting. I will try that soon Thank you Rahul 🙂
karrie @ Tasty Ever After says
Gorgeous bread Kushi! Interesting flavors and I'll have to try this at home so I can see what it tastes like. Bet it's great for breakfast with your chai tea recommendation. So funny about your Husband's love of ginger too! 🙂
Kushi says
Thank you Karrie. Do let me know how it turned out 🙂
Luci says
I'm really interested in this, I'm not sure how it could be both sweet and savoury at the same time so I really wanna give it a go! Would you recommend using the semolina, if given a choice?
Kushi says
I have added one fourth semolina in my recipe. Thank you so much. Do let me know how it turned out.
CHCooks says
Looks delicious Kushi 🙂
Kushi says
Thank you dear 🙂
jacquee | i sugar coat it! says
Cardamom AND ginger!! I am so making this!!
Kushi says
Thank you Jacquee 🙂