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Best Freekeh in Chicago

“Harvested green, set alight, rubbed clean. Ancient grain. Months-long shelf life.”

Freekeh

What the real thing tastes like

Freekeh (sometimes spelled frikeh) or farik (Arabic: فريكة / ALA-LC: farīkah; pronounced free-kah /ˈfɹiːkə/) is a cereal food made from green durum wheat (Triticum turgidum var. durum) that is roasted and rubbed to create its flavour. It is an ancient dish derived from Levantine and North African cuisines, remaining popular in many countries of the eastern Mediterranean Basin, where wheat was first domesticated. Freekeh is the name for the wheat grain prepared in a specific way. Harvested while still green and the seeds still soft, it is piled and sun-dried, and then carefully set alight such that only the straw and chaff burn, with the grain protected by its high water content. This roasted wheat is then threshed, winnowed and sun-dried again to achieve a uniform flavour, texture, and colour, and make it suitable for long-term storage. The threshing or rubbing of the burnt chaff off of the grains is what gives this food its name, from the Arabic word farīk or "rubbed". The dried berr

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Freekeh is green durum wheat caught young, sun-dried, then set deliberately ablaze—the grain's own moisture shields it while straw and chaff burn away. What emerges is roasted, threshed, and rubbed (farīk means exactly that) until the burnt hull comes clean. The result stores for months and tastes of earth and controlled fire, roasted but not charred.

Order it here when it has

  • ancient lineage across Mediterranean
  • specific roasting flavor from burning process
  • excellent storage capability

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