In Eritrea, this is usually made from a very small gray grain called Taff. This bread is an integral part of most traditional Eritrean meals. Ingera serves as both plate and utensil; foods are ladled onto it, and pieces are torn off and used to scoop up the food. It takes three days to prepare the sourdough starter and an additional day to make the bread.

2 cups all-purpose flour
8 cups self-rising flour
½ cup cornmeal
9 teaspoons solid shortening

Yield: 18 rounds

1. Mix the all-purpose flour with 2 cups of water. Put the mixture in a large jar and cover the jar with plastic warp.
2. Let the jar stand at room temperature for 3 days. This is the sourdough starter.
3. In large bowel, mix together the self-rising flour, cornmeal, 8 cups of water and all the sourdough starter. Let this batter stand at room temperature for 24 hours. It will became bubbly.
4. `remove 1 cup of the batter to a pot and add ½ cup of water. Cook, this mixture over a low heat while stirring until it became thick, about 10 minutes.
5. Remove the mixture from heat and let it cool. Stir the mixture back into the batter.
6. Add 2 ½ cups of water and mix well. Let the batter stand at room temperature for 2 hours.
7. Remove 3 cups of the batter and put it into the jar you used to make the sourdough starter the next time you make ingera (beginning with step 3.)
8. Melt ½ teaspoon of the solid shortening in a large frying pan .
9. Remove 1 cup of the batter from the bowl and pour it in a stream into the hot pan in a counter clockwise spiral, starting from outside edge of the pan.
10. Cover the pan and let the ingera cook until the edge begin to brown and curl up and the middle is dry, about 2minutes.
11. Invert the pan over a clean dishtowel. The ingera should fall out of the pan. The first ingera may not turn out as well as the following ones.
12. Repeat the steps from number 8, until all the batter is gone .
13. They may be used immediately or, after they cool, they may be stored wrapped in plastic in the refrigerator for a few days.