Home Made Pita Bread! Opa!

Home made pita!

I looked at the calendar and saw that January was slipping away, quickly, so I decided I needed to get cooking.

It was 37 degrees that morning..brrrrr!

You see I did my 5K this month, I blogged a cookbook recipe and I needed to get out and find a new blog and a recipe.  Of course Pinterest is the place to begin for me.  There, on my board called Yum! are numerous recipes I have been wanting to try.  I saw these amazing pita breads and knew what I was making.  I had chicken, dill, Greek yogurt and a cucumber, so Greek chicken on home made pitas with homemade tzaziki was in order.

The recipe has its origins at a blog called Delicious Shots. The tagline is that Food Is Beautiful.  And here, it most definitely is.  The pita breads have 4 ingredients.  Bread flour, salt, water and yeast.  How easy is that? I hope you will check out her blog and the recipe. As you well know, I never just follow a recipe, but after searching other pita bread recipes, I found most contained sugar and oil, albeit small amounts.  Her recipe is is all measured in grams, so a scale is a necessity.

I followed her recipe to the T, but found myself with one pita a little shy of 75g.  Which is fine.  They mixed and rolled out effortlessly.  Really.  They were so easy.  While they rested for 40 minutes, I made the rest of dinner.

For the chicken, I dropped frozen, boneless thighs into a LeCreuset, shook a whole lot of Cavendar's Greek Seasoning and tossed in a sliced onion.  I love this method for cooking chicken.  It has to start frozen, and somehow, magically, it shreds beautifully when done.  It also frees me up to take care of other business.  If I had fresh chicken on hand I would have grilled it for sure, but I am cleaning out the fridge and freezer, so decided the chicken had to go!  It was done in about 40 minutes at 375F.

I always have plain Greek yogurt on hand, and tucked way back in the fridge (which sparkles right now) was an almost empty container of sour cream.  So I combined them.  I drained the Greek yogurt for about an hour first, then mixed it with the sour cream and a Tablespoon of dehydrated dill.

draining the Greek yogurt

I love dehydrated herbs for great flavor and long shelf life!

I love this little avocado spoon...

I grated a large clove of garlic in with my Microplane and added about a half teaspoon of salt.  I peeled and sliced open the cucumber that was hiding out in the produce drawer, and knew by the yellowish color it was going to be bitter.  I mean it's January, where could the poor thing have traveled from?  So I seeded it with my favorite olive wood avocado spoon and cubed it and sprinkled it with salt and set it in a colander to drain.  My hope was that by drawing out the excess water the bitterness would go away too. It didn't.  Mr. Preppy is not a cucumber fan to begin with, so I scooped a little virginal tzaziki and added cucumbers for me and left the rest for him sans bitter cucumbers.  It's delicious anyway!

The last step was cooking the pita bread.  I started with an iron skillet and wiped it with a film of olive oil and heated it up.  The first pita was a little dense, so I knew it needed to be hotter.

they will gently bubble after dropping in the hot pan

flip when lightly browned

then they poof up magically!

So, I cranked the heat and they started puffing beautifully.  It did get a little overheated and a few came out a little darker than I would like, but they taste delicious!  I think I should have really rolled them a little thinner before their 40 minute proofing, because some of them were a little thick.  But when they poofed, they were perfect! You can only cook them one at a time, but I kept them warm, as told in a napkin.

don't forget the napkin!  these are messy!

To eat, basically a pita, a schmear of tzaziki, some chicken, chopped tomatoes and lots of napkins.  I am in heaven.  This was hands down, the best dinner I have had in weeks!  Mr Preppy agreed, he could not stop raving!  The tzaziki was so bright, the meat was perfectly cooked, the onions weren't overpowering and the pita bread was delicious!  So, what are you waiting for?  Get to those resolutions, and get in there and cook! Opa!