How to make Pita Bread at home like a PRO (without oven)

In this video, let's learn the A to Z of making a perfectly puffed up pita bread like a pro. The bread that is so soft and chewy that you will definitely stop buying the store-bought pita breads. To make the pita bread, we would need 2 cups of all-purpose flour or maida, half a cup of whole wheat flour or atta. The reason for adding whole wheat flour is that it helps us to easily roll our dough once it's proofed up which you will see in detail in the steps ahead. So along with that, we will also add 1 teaspoon of salt and a tablespoon of sugar. Mix them up. Add in a tablespoon of olive oil and stir it up too. Finally, to make it into a dough, we would need a cup of warm water. The ideal temperature of water for this particular recipe should be around 90 to 100 degrees Fahrenheit. We would add our yeast, around 2 teaspoons of yeast, into the water and mix it so that there is an even distribution of yeast throughout the dough. Now, I am using the instant variety of yeast which does not require any kind of activation and hence I'm directly adding it into our dry mixture. But if you're using the active dry yeast kind of variety, make sure to activate it before you proceed with the recipe. Once you add the water, just combine everything until you get a dough. Use your clean hands and then mix it together to form a dough. This is going to be a really sticky dough at this stage but do not be tempted to add any extra flour. Once you get everything together, that is all the dry mixture is hydrated and combined, just transfer it onto your worktop. And I have taken approximately half a cup of flour here but I won't add it all at once. Just sprinkle a bit and keep on kneading. As you can see, my hands are full of dough at this stage. It's all sticky and messy. Do not worry, just keep on kneading. You will get it. About three to four minutes, you can now observe that my hands are getting clean. The dough has started coming together and it is not sticking the way it was before. So, just keep on kneading and you will get to the right consistency in just about eight to ten minutes. I'll totally show you all the stages that I have been going through in this video. Since this is just a small quantity of dough, I'm not using my stand mixer and instead chose to knead it with my hands. But if you want, you can use your stand mixer. Just directly knead it for about six to eight minutes and proceed with the second step. So, as you all can see, the dough is sticking to my hand even after four minutes now, but not that much like the way we started with. If at some point you get tired and just cannot knead it, no problem. Just cover it with a tea towel and come back after five minutes and start kneading. Since I'm habituated, I'm not tired at this point and I'll just continue kneading the dough. What we are looking for is a soft and tacky dough. Yes, it should be tacky. Not sticky, not dry, but tacky. That is because the dough should have some amount of moisture content in it because this moisture is what would get converted into steam and this steam is what would be pushed up and create a balloon or puffy pita bread when it hits the hot oven or hot skillet. After 10 minutes of kneading, what I have here is a soft and smooth dough which is still sticky but not that much like the way we started with. The dough should be so soft that I can easily poke my finger in, but when I try to pull it out, I can feel some resistance. Exactly this is how you want your dough to be. Now that our dough is ready, let's proceed with the second step which is proofing for which we will prepare the bowl by adding up around a teaspoon of oil and spreading it all around. Place the dough onto it and then coat it with the oil all around so that the dough does not dry up. Cover it with a tea towel and allow it for first proofing which is two hours. I also wanted to show you guys the amount of flour that I used for dusting the flour while kneading so we started with half cup but as you all can see I might have used just around two tablespoons of it so be careful and use just the required amount. After two hours you'll see that your dough is nice smooth it has doubled in volume and it's all ready to begin with our next step but before that I just wanted to take a moment to show you guys how to store it if you wish to. So we will use a container like this and you can transfer the entire dough and store it in an airtight container like this in the refrigerator for up to a week and use as and when needed. Take just one or two pitas whatever you need and then proceed with that for the day. Keep the rest in the refrigerator. My lunch menu for that day was some pitas with veggie fillings, falafel, hummus so I totally ended up using all the dough on one single day. Yes me and my partner we just finished it all off. So right now I'm just dividing the dough into 10 equal parts just eyeballing it but if you wish you can weigh the entire dough and then divide it accordingly. Take one part of the dough just tuck the sides in so that you get a perfect round shape like this. You don't have to be too much strict or forceful on this just giving it a round shape so that it is easier for us to roll it out later. So just tuck the sides in and place it on the worktop, flatten it out and then proceed with the next one. So accordingly shape all the balls and flatten it out. Cover it with the tea towel for the moment. Dust your worktop with some dry flour that is all-purpose flour and then roll it into a disc, thin disc to be precise, of around 6 inches in diameter. Now this is another crucial step which is rolling the dough thinly. Yes just like the way how we make our phulka so thin so that it puffs up immediately on contact of heat that is the same logic that we are going to apply over here as well. Make sure to roll your dough evenly thin without any cracks or tears so that there's no chance of the steam escaping while we are cooking it. Place the rolled out dough onto the baking tray that has been pre-lined with the parchment paper. Cover it with the tea towel and allow it for second proofing which is 30 minutes. Proceeding to the next crucial step after 30 minutes of second proofing which is to cook the pitas. Just flip the pitas before you place it on the hot skillet that is the side on which you are rolling. The top side is now touching the base of our tawa. So in just 20 seconds you will observe small bubbles popping up. Slowly and gently just flip the pitas one more time and within a matter of one or two minutes you will observe that the pitas are starting to puff and it's going to get the shape of a balloon. What is happening here is that the moisture from the dough when it hits the hot tawa gets converted into steam which then pushes the pitas upwards and gets trapped and forms a pocket. This is what we call as oven spring in culinary terms. Beautiful is it looking my eyes are just popping out seeing the puff and there goes our second pita and that goes our third pita. Each and every pita puff so beautifully I just couldn't control the happiness. Find all the details of how to bake this pita bread in an oven on my blog spicesandflavors.com the link for which is in the description box and also find all the science behind baking a beautiful puffed up pita over there. Sometimes it so happens that the steam finds some way to escape out and the pitas doesn't puff. In that case gently press the pita with the help of your ladle so that the steam gets trapped inside and causes the pita to puff up. Some other time it may happen that the pita doesn't puff on its own in that case just like a paratha we will have to gently press the top portion of the pita so that it puffs up like in this case. Another thing to note is that you have to be very careful and gentle while flipping the pitas. Sometimes it happens that the pitas puff up so beautifully but you end up punching a hole or making a slit and that way the pitas then won't puff. In that case I am just gently tapping it with the help of a tissue so that I can grab as much air as possible and help it to puff and keep it soft. And don't get disheartened if your pita doesn't puff at all sometimes they just don't So the main crucial reason for this is that the skillet was not hot enough. So I just showed you an example here the one and foremost thing that you have to note is that the skillet has to be super hot otherwise the pitas won't puff. Don't get disheartened if your pitas doesn't puff sometimes it just doesn't just that you won't get a pocket for a filling but it still is so soft that you can use it to dip it into your hummus or any dip of your choice and it also makes an excellent base for pizza. So if your pita doesn't puff just lather some pizza sauce some veggies of your choice and make an amazing yummy pizza out of it. And coming to the last section of our making homemade pita bread which is to keep them wrapped in a tea towel so that the steam is captured but still the pitas have room to breathe and stay warm and soft. If you've wrapped it in a cling wrap they might get soggy and won't taste good. So this is an old grandma's trick that I'm sure most of you guys must be already doing it well. And that was from our lunch scenario that day just letting it in the middle to show you the beautiful pockets inside how gorgeous does that pockets look this is a super soft and chewy bread that is just perfect for any kinds of fillings. For that just look at the texture from within. That day we chose to fill it with some hummus, some balila salad, some falafel, fresh lettuce and garnished it with tzatziki sauce. It was such an amazing lunch I must tell you. I hope you guys like these videos with my new details that I share and you are not bored by all my blabbering. Comment below and share your thoughts with me so that I can know what you guys actually want and change my pattern accordingly. If you like this video then definitely hit that like button and subscribe to Spices and Flavors for more such baking and vegetarian related recipes. I'll see you soon with yet another one. Until then this is Sushma signing off. Take care, buh-bye!