pita bread

until yesterday i'd never made pita bread but as i was cooking a greek meal for my children i thought it was time to give it a go..i didn't start making the dough 'til quite late in the afternoon and it was really cold but fortunately i had a fire going so i was able to cosy the dough up on the hearth to prove..

pita bread

adapted from here

makes 8

ingredients

125 gms organic wholemeal flour*

250 gms organic white bread making flour*

1 tablespoon (tbs) honey**

2 tbs olive oil

1 teaspoon (tsp) yeast

1.5 tsp salt (i use crushed murray river salt)

filtered water

method 

~ mix all ingredients with enough water to make a shaggy dough

~ leave for 30 minutes and then mix again briefly

~ remove bowl from the stand mixer, cover with either oiled cling film or a damp tea towel, and leave to prove until doubled

~ tip dough onto a flour dusted bench and knead briefly

~ divide evenly into 8 pieces

~ shape into rounds and leave on the bench for 10-15 minutes for the dough to relax

~ place a baking stone or tray (i used a cast iron frying pan) in the oven and heat the oven to 220 deg c

~ roll each piece of dough into a thin round 

~ place the dough on the cooking surface of choice, cook for 3-4 minutes by which time the bread will have puffed up, turn over and cook for a further 2 minutes

notes:

*  i bought the organic wholemeal and white lauke flours from red beard bakery in trentham..they don't sell pre packaged bags of the wholemeal flour because of it's rapid deterioration rate but they kindly offered to bag up any quantity i wanted..as a result i don't know its protein level but the white flour has 11.5%..  

** i used manna gum honey that i bought from a local producer in trentham  

i served the pita with lamb fillet souvlakia, baked potatoes and olives in lemon and oil, a roasted capsicum, garlic, chilli and dehydrated tomato (my own) concasse and a home grown mixed green (cos and oak leaf lettuce, rocket, watercress, nasturtium and coriander and parsley leaves) and flower (cerise carnation petals, purple and white violets and yellow, white and purple pansies) salad with a pomegranate dressing..