COPPERLahoh recipe
Sorghum flatbread fermented overnight and cooked on one side only, so the top stays a lace of open holes.
Ingredients
- 200 g sorghum flour
- 100 g white cornmeal
- 100 g all-purpose flour
- 800 ml water
- 1 tsp active dry yeast
- 1 tsp salt
How to make Lahoh
- Whisk 100 g sorghum flour, 100 g white cornmeal and 100 g plain flour with 1 tsp salt.
- Dissolve 1 tsp yeast in 800 ml warm water, pour it onto the flours and beat by hand for 5 to 10 minutes until creamy and smooth. This beating is what builds the crumb.
- Cover and ferment at room temperature for 8 to 12 hours, overnight. The batter must smell sour and be full of bubbles; a ladleful of a previous batch, the dhanaan, speeds it up.
- Stir gently and thin with a little water if needed until the batter pours like cream.
- Heat a heavy ungreased pan over medium heat until a drop of batter sets on contact.
- Pour a ladleful in the centre and swirl the pan to spread it to a 20 cm disc.
- Cook on one side only for 2 to 3 minutes, until the top is dry and covered in holes. Never flip it: the holed face is the whole point.
- Stack under a cloth and serve warm with ghee and sugar, with honey, or alongside a meat stew and tea.
What is Lahoh?
Lahoh is a traditional dish from Djibouti, stewed slowly, and takes about 10 hours and 40 minutes from start to finish. It is built around sorghum flour, white cornmeal and all-purpose flour. The recipe below uses 6 ingredients and is written out step by step.
How long does Lahoh take?
At 640 minutes it is slower than 82% of the 586 dishes in Copper's atlas. Copper's atlas has 6 dishes built on sorghum flour. The method runs to 8 steps, the longest being 10 minutes.
Any tips for making Lahoh?
Cook lahoh on one side only and never flip it: the top must dry into a lace of open holes.
How Lahoh compares
Hard to find elsewhere: white cornmeal (1) and active dry yeast (3).
Cooked with the same thing elsewhere
Other traditional dishes built on active dry yeast, from other countries.
- Khachapuri adjaruli 🇬🇪 Georgia
- Mkatra foutra 🇰🇲 Comoros
Copper documents Djibouti alongside 197 other countries. Every recipe is free to read, with the full ingredient list and every step.