HOME BAKED PITA BREAD

“There’s nothing like the smell of fresh baked bread in the morning!” my husband always says that when I bake bread for breakfast. Well, as it was winter break, we kind of had brunch :D

As our bread, we always buy pita. In the past (maybe until a year ago) I baked all my bread at home, but somehow I got lazier and lazier, so we started buying our pita from Al Sanabil Bakery and Market on Thompson Lane, Nashville.
Have you ever tried to bake your own pita at home? Well, you should. It's not that hard and the taste is amazing!

The best pita is piping hot from the oven filled with some cheese that immediately melts in the folds of fragrant bread!!! Just be careful while opening the just baked pita for it is full of hot steam.

Home Baked Pita Bread


PITA BREAD (33 pita breads)

Ingredients:

5 pounds all-purpose flour

5 cups water, 99 – 100*F

1 tbsp salt

6 tbsp dry milk

Yeast Slurry Ingredients:

1 cup water, 99 – 100*F

4 tsp dry yeast

1 tsp sugar

Directions for yeast slurry:

Combine all the ingredients for yeast slurry in a small bowl and let the slurry rest covered with plastic warp for 5 minutes, so that yeast starts reacting.

Directions for dough:

Put all dry ingredients for the dough in a large bowl. Stir with a wooden spoon to combine. Add water and yeast slurry. Mix with wooden spoon until the ingredients come together and then continue kneading the dough by hand for at least 10 minutes. The dough has to be smooth and elastic. If the dough is too wet and it still sticks to the sides of the bowl, sprinkle in some more flour just until it clears the sides. If the dough is too dry, sprinkle with some more water. Turn the dough onto a working board and knead some more.

Let the dough rise covered at room temperature for 45 minutes.

Divide the dough into 33 equally large dough balls and cover them with damp cloth towel.

Start rolling each ball into approximately 6 inches large circle. Place the rolled dough onto a table covered with large cloth to rest. When you are half way through the rolling process, you can start baking the bread. 

Bake in 500*F preheated oven 2 pitas at a time on the lowest rack for 2 minutes on first side, flip, and bake for just 30 seconds more.

Take out of the oven and let cool down on a rack before refrigerating or freezing. 

Although not all the pitas will plump out perfectly :(