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Best Matnakash in San Francisco
“Finger pull and draw: matnakash's name describes the hand-shaped technique that defines this golden Armenian bread.”
What the real thing tastes like
Matnakash (Armenian: մատնաքաշ) is a leavened traditional Armenian bread. The word matnakash means "finger draw" or "finger pull", referring to the way the bread is prepared. It is made of wheat flour with yeast or sourdough starter. It is shaped into oval or round loaves with longitudinal or criss-crossed scoring. The characteristic golden or golden-brown color of its crust is achieved by coating the surface of the loaves with sweetened tea essence before baking. Matnakash is also popular in places with large Armenian populations as a result of the Armenian diaspora.
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Matnakash is a leavened Armenian bread whose name tells you exactly how it's made — your fingers pull and draw across the dough, creating those signature scored patterns. Wheat flour, yeast or sourdough, shaped into ovals or rounds, then brushed with sweetened tea before the oven transforms it into golden-brown loaves with a particular warmth that comes from that tea-glazed crust.
Order it here when it has
- golden-brown crust
- characteristic sweetened tea glaze
- distinctive finger-pull shaping
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