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Pita Breads

These breads, characterised by a pocket are relatively simple to produce.

Ingredients:
Laucke Plain or Bakers Flour 1kg
Yeast (dry) 0.01kg
Salt 0.015kg
Malted Barley (optional) 0.0025kg
Bread Improver (optional) 0.01kg
Water (10% less than a normal dough) 0.58 kg

The dough at 28 deg C should be well developed and allowed to recover for about 30 minutes.

Dependant upon required size of finished product scale the dough pieces and round them up into well shaped pieces. Allow to recover for 15 to 20 minutes and then sheet the pieces one way and rotate through 180 degrees and sheet again to form a nice circular flat dough piece of about 2 mm in thickness. The size is varied by weight not by thickness.

These dough pieces are then proved for 15 minutes in a fairly dry prover on cloth or semolina covered boards and then turned over and proved for a further 15 minutes proof. Total proof time 30 minutes.

High oven sole temperatures are required to quickly generate steam, and this steam blows the hole in the interior of the bread by separating the rapidly formed crust.

For optimum quality, baking is the critical factor.

The Pita Breads should be baked on a clean oven sole or on polished heavy metal trays at a temperature of between 490 and 600 deg C (910 to 1050 deg F) for up to 80 seconds. Hotter ovens give better results. Gas ovens are generally considered to give better results. Normal bakers ovens are not suitable for baking at the higher temperatures.

After the breads are removed from the oven they will collapse into the flat bread as we know it.

Fat or oil should not be added as it will reduce the strength of the product when it is stored over extended periods.

To create a more pungent acid aroma consistent with the traditional product some dough should be carried over from one day to the next and mixed in with the fresh batch. Up to 10 or 20% would be acceptable.

Background
Research into Middle Eastern style breads by the Australian Wheat Board and the Bread Research Institute has highlighted two key points.

1. Research has proven that genetic and environmental factors have a large influence over the quality of the wheats used for producing the flour and thus the final product.
2. Middle Eastern countries have identified as a result of this research that South Australian hard wheats produce very good products for them and they have a preference for our wheats.