Not your Mama's Matzah!!!!

Josephus’s Homemade Matzah

Works of Flavius Josephus

Makes Two -Three round Matzah’s

Josephus Flavius was a famous Jewish historian of the first century at the time of the Second Temple destruction.  If Josephus had come across this Matzah recipe, he would have included it in his writings.

2 Cups of Bread Flour ( or 2 cups of your favorite non-gluten flour)

½ Tsp finely ground fresh pepper                                         

2 Lg eggs slightly beaten

1½ Tbl Honey

1 Tbl Olive Oil

¼ Cup Water

1 Lg Onion finely chopped (size of corn kernels)

(Roasted Garlic optional)

Kosher Salt

Cheese Cloth

Some more Olive Oil on the side

Optional- Use Schmaltz and Gribenes. Saute your onions in Schmaltz and add your Gribenes to the final dough recipe.

Preheat your oven to 500 degrees.  If you have a pizza stone use it.  Alternatively, use some unglazed ceramic tiles.  Use a cookie tray if you do not have any of the above. 

Sauté the Onion in some butter and olive oil on a very small flame until the onions are caramelized. The onions should be very dark in color but not burnt.  When you initially toss in your onions add some

Kosher Salt to the onions (½ tsp), which will help draw out some of the moisture.  After several minutes, toss in about ½ tsp of sugar, which will help with the caramelizing. 

An optional technique that I use to drain the Onions is to put them in cheese cloth. After they have cooled slightly squeeze out the remaining moisture and oil/butter.   In addition

I make the onions the day before and after I have squeezed all I can I put them in a sieve weighed down with something heavy and refrigerate till the next day so I can get out every last bit of moisture and oil/butter.

To your beaten eggs add the pepper, Honey, Olive Oil, water, and caramelized onions (mix thoroughly especially if onions were refrigerated over night).  In a large bowl toss in 1½ cups of the flour, make a well and add your egg mixture.  Make your Matzah dough and use the reserved ½ flour to bring the dough together.  You may need more or less flour depending on the humidity of your kitchen.  Knead your dough for about 8-15 minutes until it springs back when you shove your thumb into it.  Cover the dough with plastic wrap and let rest for about 15 minutes.  Resting the dough will relax the gluten and make it easier to roll out.  Using a rolling pin roll out your dough to your desired shape and size.  Take a fork and pierce the dough making sure to go all the way

through.  Do this on both sides and make sure you cover the whole Matzah full of holes.  Using a pastry brush lightly brush dough on one side with olive oil and sprinkle with just a little bit of kosher salt and transfer using a Pizza Peel ( I pierce and prepare

dough on the Pizza Peel for easy transfer).  If you plan to use a cookie sheet, make sure to use parchment paper.  If using a pizza stone you will need to cook it about 3-5 minutes and if you’re not using a stone it might require a longer cooking time. 

Note: I like weighting the final dough and than scaling it in using a scale.  My preference is 7-9 oz little dough balls to be rolled out into little Matzahs.                                   

I.E I usually make a lot of Matzah's so lets say I make 8 lbs of dough which yields 128 oz, that give me 16  8 oz Matzahs.   Lots of eating.