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Background
Aria Super Market is a specialty supermarket in Alameda that caters mostly to a middle Eastern audience, with halal foods, and a lot of exotic and interesting things. This is not a fancy place -- in fact it looks a bit run down from the outside, and the inside is certainly not fancy. But it is well worth a visit. In the back, there is a bakery, which I accidentally stumbled upon, and every day they bake special breads like they used to in Afghanistan. You will have a tough time finding anything like it anywhere else (except perhaps around Fremont). Appearance
This bread comes in a huge transparent plastic bag. There is probably no other way, given the gigantic size of this thing. This is a rather unique loaf -- extremely long, almost three feet long in fact, wide and very flat, and quite flexible. You tend to hang it around your arm like a vestment rather than carry it. It has deep wrinkles on top, which give it an attractive, fun appearance. Beautiful brown color, with sesame seeds on top. The density is hard to gauge, given the very unusual shape and sheer dimensions. The feel is not unlike that of a fresh Indian nan, but it is thicker (almost an inch) and has no pocket inside. The outside smell is very good: fresh and bready. If you are weary of unusual smells and tastes, by the way, you can relax with this one: the smell and taste are very mainstream and would not attract much attention in a typical American restaurant. There is no cut needed, this is the kind of bread you just break chunks out of. Taste
There is no crust on this bread, it's pretty much all crumb. It's quite fluffy, and I liked the taste. I can see that it would go quite well with a barbecue, or a big outdoors picnic. Conclusion
The taste is fairly good, but I am giving this bread an extra credit for the obvious artisanship that goes into its making, and the attraction of an unusual appearance. |
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Copyright © 2003 Max Tardiveau. All rights reserved.
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