Lahmacun - street food, Arab speciality or - at least in Germany - just an alternative to Dürüm? The rolled flat bread is also called 'Turkish pizza', even though it is 4000 years old and much older than the Italian model, which was born in the 18th century. The term Lahmacun comes from the Aramaic ('lahm am dschun') and can be translated into 'dough with meat'. After we have dealt with some rather technical topics in the blog in the last weeks, we now come back to lighter food. In the truest sense of the word! We are travelling mentally to the region of origin of many of our employees and company founders: the Middle East.
Lahmacun is a flat bread made of yeast dough, which is spread with a spice paste of tomatoes, minced meat and onions before being baked and then eaten hot from the oven. In Germany, Lahmacun is known for using the snack instead of a classic flatbread, filling it with salad, sauce and possibly kebab meat and then rolling it up. A Dürüm alternative. Traditionally, the topped flat cakes are served only with parsley, pieces of onion and a piece of lemon. It is also rolled up in this version.
In Turkey, Lahmacun was the second most ordered dish of the nation in 2017, in 2018 it was in third place behind Burger and Döner. Now there is also a vegan alternative that also attracts meat eaters to the shop. It is topped with linseed, tomatoes, onions, lentils and other vegetables to look and taste like the original Lahmacun. Inventor Yılmaz Angay says: 'Some of our customers even say they wouldn't even know it was a vegan Lahmacun if they didn't know. The idea for vegan Lahmacun came about because of demand. Newly converted vegans often have the urge to try the food they ate before, and Lahmacun is at the top of the list.'