Whole Wheat Pitas

I have another recipe from the King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking book for you today.

As I was flipping through the pages I notices a recipe for whole wheat pitas, and I thought to myself, “Meh, pitas are so dry and not very good; why would someone take the time to make them?!” And then I read the introduction to the recipe and it said something along the lines of – store bought whole wheat pitas not only have the texture of cardboard but taste like it too. Yes! That is so true. But then the book went on to tell how wonderfully tender and delicious the homemade version was. My interest was peaked and I put it on my list.

When I made these whole wheat pitas I was surprised at how easy it was. Whip up a dough, let it rise, roll it out, cook it super hot, done. My kids loved helping me roll out the dough and they were a fun change from bread for our egg salad. These would be a fun Saturday morning activity for the family because not only is it pretty easy and hands on, but the family will go nuts when the pitas puff up in the oven. It was a lot of fun and they taste good to boot.

Enjoy and don’t forget to enter to win a copy of King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking book of your own (enter at the bottom of the post).

Since we have our own hens we love egg salad and eat it often. Check out the color of the yolk and how bright that egg salad is! Backyard chickens are the best.

Whole Wheat Pita Bread

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Ingredients

• 1 ¼ cups warm water
• 2 T. olive oil
• 1 ½ tsp. yeast
• 1 ½ tsp. salt
• 1 ¾ whole wheat flour
• 1 ½ cups bread flour

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Instructions

1. In the bowl of your stand mixer combine the water, oil, yeast, and salt. Let the mixture stand for 5 minutes. Add all of the whole wheat flour and mix with the dough hook for 5 minutes. Add the bread flour, ¼ cup at a time, until the dough starts to come together. The dough should still stick to the bottom of the bowl but it will pull away from the sides. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead until the dough is lightly tacky.
2. Don’t add too much flour. It’s ok for it to be a bit tacky. Whole wheat flour continues to absorb moisture as it develops and a dry dough isn’t what you want for pitas.
3. Shape the dough into a ball and place it in a bowl. Cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap and allow the dough to rise until doubled, about 1 ½ hours.
4. Towards the end of the rising time place a baking stone on the bottom rack of the oven and preheat to 450 degrees.
5. After the rising time divide the dough in half and divide each half into 4 pieces. Roll each piece of dough into a ball and then cover the balls. Let the balls of dough rest for 10 minutes (this will make them easier to roll out).
6. Using a rolling pin, roll each ball into a 6 inch circle that is less than ¼ inch thick. You might need to lightly flour your work surface to keep the dough from sticking.
7. Place two pitas directly on the stone (you can use a baker’s peel if needed). Cook the pitas for 5 minutes total, turning once after they have ballooned after 3 to 4 minutes. Remove the pitas from the oven and repeat with the remaining dough. Stack the warm pitas together in a kitchen towel to keep them from crisping as they cool.

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Disclosure: King Arthur Flour is providing the prize for the giveaway and doing the shipping. They sent me the book and 2 bags of flour in the mail to work on this post with. I wasn’t paid to post or for my gushing, I just really like them, and you will too!