Pita Bread

[BakerAunt]

I'm curious as to whether anyone else has baked pita bread. The recipe that I baked last week--the Pita Chips recipe from KABC--was good, but it had thick bottoms and thin tops. Is that typical of homemade pita breads? I will probably bake pita bread again, but I'm wondering if another recipe might produce breads that are more equal on each side.

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[chocomouse]

I've made pitas, actually think I learned in a class at KAF, many years ago. I was not impressed. I do make tortillas, which I prefer, for wraps, and a couple other kinds of flatbread, also from the class. I do remember that mine puffed just fine, but not much else about them. Sorry I can't be of any help.

[Mike Nolan]

It's been a few years but we've made pitas, I don't remember what recipe we were using. They were good, but I've eaten better.

[BakerAunt]

I will start looking through my numerous baking books and comparing pita recipes. I liked the puff and the flavor of these. I'm wondering if technique would give a more even thickness on sides.

[Mike Nolan]

Pita is fascinating to watch bake, but I'm not sure how possible it is to control evenness, because it's going to pull apart as it puffs up, and that might be challenging to control.

Would the thickness of the dough impact that? Might be interesting to test.

[kimbob]

The only pitas I ever made were MrsM's recipe. It may be saved somewhere here. They came out pretty even as I remember. Used www and ap flour. Swirth, the search guru, may be able to find it.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 7 months ago by kimbob.

[BakerAunt]

The only pita bread recipe I have found here is from Frick, yet another one of those people I miss from the Baking Circle who I wish had joined us:

Pita Bread by frick

I did a search using Mrs.M, and no pita bread recipe came up, so it either was not posted on the last incarnation of the Baking Circle or it did not get transferred here.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 7 months ago by BakerAunt.

[Mike Nolan]

I think there are one or two other pita recipes here, but neither are MrsM's. There's a MrsM on Pinterest, but I'm not sure if it is the same person and the pita recipe appears to be a link to someone else's recipe.

The KAF whole grains book has a recipe where you use 55% whole wheat flour, Beard on Bread recommends using 'hard wheat' flour, so he'd probably prefer bread flour over AP. This may be one of those cases where the oil you use (usually olive oil) makes a big difference in the taste.

I don't honestly remember what recipe we used the last time we made pita, it was at least 12 years ago.

The Persian restaurant that we like buys their pita from Omaha. A couple of years ago they couldn't get the pita they preferred one week, they were apologizing for its poor quality, though I thought it was still pretty good.

When we were in Germany in 2006, our son introduced us to doner kebab, which are served wrapped in a large flatbread that is like a pita but not split.

[cwcdesign]

This recipe is from The Baking Steel. I used it the last time I made pitas and will definitely use it again. I will probably sub in some white whole wheat or sprouted wheat flour. Of course I used my Baking Steel for baking, but you could probably do it on a sheet pan at high heat.
https://bakingsteel.com/blogs/news/picture-perfect-pita-bread?_pos=1&_sid=f960bdc01&_ss=r

I used a little bit of my tax refund to splurge on their mini griddle. Now I should be able to make my English muffins, among other things, on my stove top without oil spilling on the stove.

[kimbob]

This is the recipe I've used.

1/2 tsp instant yeast
3/4 cup white wheat flour (4 oz)
3/4 cup unbleached flour (4 oz)
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tbsp olive oil
5 oz water

Put all in bread machine and do 1 knead cycle. Let rise for 2-3 hrs (or overnight) until a little more than double in bulk. Heat stone at 450 degrees for 1/2 hour or use parchment lined pan. Cut dough into 6 pieces and roll into balls. Put flour on counter and flatten a little into a circle by hand and flour both sides. Let rest 10 minutes and then roll into a 6 or 7 inch round that's 1/8 inch thick. Place on stone and bake for 4-5 minutes. Stack them on a towel and cover. When cool store in a ziploc bag.

[kimbob]

Cwcdesign, that recipes looks really good.

[rottiedogs]

I posted Mrs M's recipes way back when so I went digging. I didn't have anything for pita bread from Mrs M but I did find a thread for Pita Recipes. I just posted it. Lots of discussion on flat vs pockets.

[kimbob]

Rottiedogs, it may not have been MrsM's. It was so long ago. I may have mixed up her pizzelle recipe I use with the pita one. 😂 thanks for checking.

[BakerAunt]

I'm not sure that the thread Rottidogs posted got onto the site. I do not see it in the list on the left, and it isn't in the "threads from the Baking Circle" section. Mike may have to see where it went.

In looking at the recipes associated with MrsM, I saw that often she does have recipes from other places that she adapted.

[Mike Nolan]

The only other pita bread recipe I see on the site is a 'pocketless pita' recipe. I think there are two threads carried over from the KAFBC that give a bunch of recipes for dips that you can use pita with, but neither of them have MrsM's pita recipe.

Zen said she had captured the recipes from the final KAFBC, but I couldn't get in contact with her to ask her to send them to me, if I had them I could probably find some way to organize them. But if the information was buried in a thread, it may be lost.

My wife doesn't remember what recipe she used to make pitas, either, she did say that while they were good, she didn't think they were worth the effort, especially since we were doing it during the summer and it really heated up the kitchen.

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