Stand mixer
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Traditional method
Noon barbari
نون بربری · Barbari · Nan barbari
A yeast-raised Iranian flatbread with a crisp roomal-glazed crust, long grooves and a soft interior.
An Iranian home recipe
Homa describes Barbari as a Persian flatbread baked throughout Iran. It is commonly eaten hot at breakfast with foods such as feta, walnuts, clotted cream, honey, butter, jam, grapes or cucumbers. The loaf has a crisp crust and airy interior, with deep lengthwise grooves and a roomal glaze.
This measured home formula uses active dry yeast. Homa separately describes bakery workers starting sourdough khamir before dawn for production. This recipe does not reproduce that bakery starter or claim that the two raising methods are interchangeable.
Sources for this section
Dough and roomal
The dough is intentionally soft and sticky. Homa recommends bread flour and warns that adding flour into the dough or kneading beyond the stated three minutes can make the bread dense. The measured flour for the work surface dusts hands and the dough during dividing; it is not mixed into the risen dough.
Roomal is a cooked flour, water and baking-soda glaze. The source heats it until uniformly cloudy and slightly thickened; it then thickens further as it cools. It coats the shaped loaf and contributes to the browned crust.
Sources for this section
Grooves and high-heat baking
Divide the dough into three portions, shape each into an oval, and use fingertips to press connected lengthwise grooves without tearing through the dough. The recipe uses a preheated pizza stone and parchment slid from a board. Each loaf bakes for 10 minutes at 500°F, with a turn halfway through. The source allows shortening the second half to four minutes if the bread darkens too quickly.
The formula yields three loaves. The source gives no domestic oven alternative without a stone, so this record keeps the specified equipment and method.
Sources for this section
Storage and serving
The author says the bread is best warm and advises cooling extra pieces completely before closing them in a plastic bag at room temperature for up to one day. No longer storage duration is established here.
Serve with the breakfast foods Homa lists, or cut the warm bread into pieces after brushing excess flour from the underside.
Sources for this section
Within Iranian bakery culture
Encyclopaedia Iranica places barbari among four principal urban bakery breads, alongside taftun, lavash and sangak. It describes a relatively thick oval loaf and breakfast service, often with cheese. That comparison locates barbari within a varied bread culture rather than making every Iranian flatbread interchangeable.
The bakery account and Homa's household method serve different purposes. This page keeps her three smaller loaves, active dry yeast, cooked roomal and pizza-stone bake. It does not import the dimensions, dough weights or oven practices of the encyclopaedia's bakery description into the recipe.
Sources for this section
History
Homa describes Barbari as a traditional Persian bread baked throughout Iran and presents this formula as the closest home version to the bread she grew up eating. Her account says Iranian bakeries prepare sourdough khamir for production, while this household recipe uses active dry yeast; the two raising methods should not be conflated.
Ingredients
Yield 3 loaves · Scaling: source batch only
11 mL2¼ tsp as recorded
3.7 mL¾ tsp as recorded
WaterDivide into two 1-cup portions; lukewarm for yeast and dough.
473 mL2 cup as recorded
Bread flourFor the dough.
1.01 L4¼ cup as recorded
Bread flourFor dusting the work surface and hands; do not knead it into the dough.
79 mL0.33 cup as recorded
9.9 mL2 tsp as recorded
FlourFor roomal glaze.
4.9 mL1 tsp as recorded
WaterCold; for roomal glaze.
59 mL¼ cup as recorded
Baking sodaFor roomal glaze.
1.2 mL¼ tsp as recorded
WaterBoiling hot; for roomal glaze.
59 mL¼ cup as recorded
Sesame seeds (optional)White, black, or a combination.
12 mL2½ tsp as recorded
2–3 teaspoons totalMethod
Risks and precautions · Standard risk
The oven and pizza stone are at 500°F; use oven mitts and a board suited to transferring bread. The source gives a one-day room-temperature storage instruction for fully cooled leftovers.
- Measure 4¼ cups bread flour into a bowl, add the salt, and stir briefly. Set aside.
- Put the yeast and sugar in a stand-mixer bowl. Warm 1 cup water until lukewarm, add it, stir gently, cover the bowl, and leave for 10 minutes. The mixture should become frothy. If it does not, replace the yeast before proceeding.
- Place a pizza stone on the middle oven rack and preheat the oven to 500°F (260°C). Warm the second cup of water until lukewarm.
- Mix half the flour into the yeast mixture. Add the remaining warm water and flour and mix until combined. Beat with a dough hook on medium-low for 3 minutes, until no dry flour remains. The dough will be sticky; do not add extra flour or knead longer.
- Transfer the dough to a clean bowl. Cover it tightly and leave at room temperature for 25 minutes; it should rise to about twice its starting volume.
- While the dough rests, whisk 1 teaspoon flour into ¼ cup cold water in a small skillet until smooth. Add ¼ teaspoon baking soda and ¼ cup boiling water. Stir over medium-low heat until the glaze is very hot, reaches a very slow boil, becomes evenly cloudy and thickens slightly. Remove from the heat; it thickens further as it cools.
- Dust the work surface with up to ⅓ cup flour. Divide the dough visually into three portions. With floured hands, lift each portion, coat it lightly with flour to form a ball, and set it on the surface. Do not knead in the dusting flour. Leave the balls uncovered for 10 minutes.
- Flatten one ball into an oval about 6 by 9 inches. Spread about 1 tablespoon roomal over it. Press rows of indentations into the dough with your fingertips, then connect them into long grooves without cutting through. Sprinkle with one-third of the seeds and rest for 5 minutes.
- Cover a cutting board or the back of a baking sheet with a 10 by 15 inch sheet of parchment. Release the dough with a pastry cutter or spatula, then carefully stretch it to about 6 by 14 inches and transfer it to the parchment.
- Slide the parchment and dough onto the hot pizza stone. Bake for 5 minutes, turn the bread and parchment halfway around, and bake 5 minutes more until golden brown. If it darkens too quickly, the source advises shortening the second bake to 4 minutes. Use oven mitts to remove it and cool on a rack.
- Shape and bake the other two loaves in the same way. When cool enough to handle, brush excess flour from their backs and cut into pieces. The source recommends eating them warm; for leftovers, cool completely and store in a closed plastic bag at room temperature for up to one day.
Conditions
Yield3 loaves
Fermentationfrom 0.67 h
Temperature260°C
Places
Iran
Documented preparation · Country evidenceHoma describes Barbari as baked across Iran and gives this Iranian home formula; no narrower birthplace is claimed.
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Equipment
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Sources
Persian Mama; HomaInspiration · Geography · History
PERSIAN BARBARI BREAD | نون بربریIran-wide association, breakfast use and common accompaniments; author's distinction between bakery sourdough khamir and this active-dry-yeast home recipe; full measured three-loaf formula; yeast activation, bulk rise, glaze, shaping, 500°F stone bake, timing and storage directions.
Cited in: An Iranian home recipe; Dough and roomal; Grooves and high-heat baking; Storage and serving; Within Iranian bakery culture
Encyclopaedia IranicaContext
BREADIncludes barbari among four main urban Iranian bakery breads and describes it as a relatively thick oval leavened bread commonly eaten at breakfast with cheese. This comparative cultural description does not specify the household formula.
Cited in: Within Iranian bakery culture
Wikimedia CommonsImage reference
File:Barbary Baker.jpgIndividually checked CC BY-SA 2.0 photograph, not PD/CC0; excluded from qualifying reference count.
Wikimedia CommonsImage reference
File:Barbari_bread_01.jpgAbolfazl Arabjavadi / Mehr News Agency, CC BY 4.0; individually checked and excluded, not PD/CC0.
Wikimedia CommonsImage reference
File:Barbari_bread_Iran.jpgMilad Mosapoor's attribution-only permission; commercial and derivative use allowed with attribution, but not PD/CC0; excluded.
Wikimedia CommonsImage reference
File:Barbari_bread.jpgWayiran, CC BY-SA 3.0; individually checked and excluded, not PD/CC0.
Wikimedia CommonsImage reference
File:Iranian_Bread_1.JPGIDangerMouse own 2008 photograph, explicit worldwide public-domain release. Visually confirmed finished elongated Barbari loaves with lengthwise grooves; approved linked-6267aa79ba494d93, durable original reference 4a850980-2707-4373-90e6-f0a97e6a78c7. Bakery-scale form, not proof of exact household dimensions.