Pita Bread

All day at work, I thought about making bread. I wanted to come home and bake bread.The only problem was, I didn't need to bake bread. I still have three loaves in the freezer from the last time I baked. Then I remembered my pita bread recipe. I hadn't made pita bread for a long time and it would be perfect as something different to bring to work for those cold lunches. So I came home and made pita bread.



Pita Bread

3 1/2 cups bread flour (I used one cup white and rest was whole wheat)
1 t salt
1 T dry active yeast
1 t sugar
1 t olive oil
1 1/3 cups water

combine flour and salt in a large bowl.

Combine yeast, sugar, and 1/3 cup warm water. Stir and set aside for about until yeast is bubbly.

Make a well in the flour mixture, add the yeast mixture, one cup warm water, and the olive oil. Mix and form the dough into a ball.

Turn dough onto floured surface and knead for ten minutes. (Honestly, I never do it that long--10 minutes is a long time!)

Place dough in large oiled bowl, cover with damp cloth, set in a warm place, and let rise until doubled in size. Then punch down and form into a smooth ball.

Cut the ball into 12 uniform pieces, form each piece into a ball, roll out each ball and place on a baking sheet dusted with corn meal. Cover the flat pieces with a damp towel and let rest for 45 minutes. (I rolled out three at time---that is what fit on the cast iron skillet I was using for a baking sheet---and only let them set about 10 minutes. )
Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Bake pitas for for 2 two 3 minutes, then flip over and bake for another couple of minutes. Don't overbake! Wrap the hot pitas in a damp towel as they cool to keep them soft.

It always amazes me how they can go from being completely flat........
to all puffed up in a matter of seconds when placed in the hot oven!For dinner we had the pitas stuffed with chicken, tomatoes, summer squash, and fresh pesto. (Hmmm....note to self, don't take pictures of food on rooster plates...having a rooster tail in the picture doesn't do anything for the food.)