Pitas

I'm only two weeks in, and already I have found things that I will NEVER buy again!  One of them, is pita bread.  I typically have grand ideas when I see them at the grocery store and slip them into my cart, and every single time I am disappointed by the hard, awful bread.  It never opens properly, it rips and cracks and it really doesn't taste that good.

Enter homemade pita.  Soft, pliable, delicious.

1 tsp granulated sugar

2 cups warm water

1 pkg (1Tbsp) active dry yeast

Dissolve sugar and yeast in water and let stand on the counter until frothy looking (about 5-10 min)

I was about to do this in my mixer, but remembered early enough that simple doughs like this work out even better in the food processor...  so into there I put:

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 cup vegetable oil

3 tsp salt

yeast mixture

run the food processor until well mixed, then add an additional 3 cups flour, one cup at a time, until the mixture forms a ball and start to clean the side of the bowl.  This will make a sticky mess.

Dump the whole lot onto a floured surface and knead for about 5 minutes (pick your food processor blade out first).  The dough will become soft and smooth and elastic.  I find sometimes when kneading, leaving it for a minute (like I did by answering the phone) and then coming back makes your life easier. 

Once it's smooth and soft, put it in an oiled bowl and cover with a tea towel and leave for about an hour and a half.  While it's rising, find some tea towels, or a big clean bath towel (one that has been washed enough that it's not leaving fluffs everywhere) and make it damp.  In order to have soft pitas, you need to cool them between damp layers of fabric.  If you want crispy pitas, skip this step.

Once doubled in size, dump it onto the counter and cut it into 16 pieces.

Then roll them out into flat pitas.

Let them hang out there for a bit, and get used to their new shape, and let your oven preheat.  500ºF.  This is a HOT oven.  I have a wall oven and the first time I did this I had a container of gummy bears in the cupboard above and they died a slow molten death.  This is something to do if your kids are napping, especially if you have a standard range.  Put a cookie sheet in the oven while it preheats, because you need it to be hot too.

It'll take a bit to preheat, so go, have a glass of wine.  This is, of course, if having a glass of wine won't make you forget to do important things like use oven mitts. Then, skip the wine, because forgetting that will be a disaster.  I have lousy oven mitts (mainly because my nice ones are decorative and I don't want them to get dirty), so I used an oven mitt AND a potholder to handle the cookie sheet. 

Pull the pan from the oven and carefully put 3 or so flattened pitas on it and pop it back in.

Bake for about 4 minutes until they start to brown slightly and puff up.  I find that sometimes they don't puff up completely, but to be honest, these are so soft, I usually use them to wrap insead of opening the pockets. If you want to use them as pockets, experiment with different thicknesses.  Also, getting them as round as possible helps.

Once they're done, pop them between your damp towels and let them cool.

I used these for dinner last night (mmmm gyros!) and the I layered the leftovers with waxed paper and put them in a freezer bag and froze them.  They defrost quite well, and I often use them for pita pizzas when I'm in a rush.

Just as a hint...  if you start eating them warm, you may not stop.