Grilled Pita Bread

The summer that I was fortunate enough to study abroad in Jerusalem, I discovered a new love: fresh pita bread. This was not the kind you buy at Safeway, which is dry, thin, and usually feels like diet food. This was freshly baked, fluffy, and divine. Any time we walked into the old city from our campus on Mount Scopus (just across the Kidron Valley from the old city), we'd be sure to buy a stack of fresh pita. It was delicious on its own, swiped through a dish of hummus, stuffed with falafel, roasted lamb, or fresh nectarines and honey. We were always ecstatic when dinner at the Center included pita and greedily took as much as we could. (It's a good thing we did so much walking there.)

I recently stumbled across a recipe I had for making pita bread. I have not really enjoyed American pita in the 14 years since I experienced the real thing. I vaguely remembered making it once, and promptly decided that it was time to try it again. I already had Tandoori Chicken on my menu for last night and even though it meant a little Indian-Middle Eastern fusion (which doesn't bother me in the least), it sounded like the perfect night for pita.

This recipe calls for baking it in the oven, but with my newly acquired skills for pizza grilling (thanks, Prudy, for taking away my fear and helping me find another food I adore), I knew I could grill these babies up in a snap with fluffy, just-like-the-old-city results. I think they are much better this way, so don't use the oven unless there is a monsoon outside.

Pita Bread

• 3 cups flour
• 1 1/2 T. sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
• 4 tsp. yeast
• 1 1/2 cup ROOM TEMP. water.
• 2 T. melted butter

Mix together the flour, sugar, salt, and yeast in a stand mixer. Add water and melted butter and knead with dough hook for 10 minutes. Put in a lubed up bowl and allow to raise for an hour to an hour and a half.

On a lightly floured surface, divide dough into 8 equal portions. Allow the dough to rest for 20 minutes. Roll out into disks that will be between 6 and 8" in diameter. Get your grill ready (scrape it clean and spray it before you fire it up.) Heat it to 400 or 450 degrees. Gently lift as many disks as will comfortably fit (I did four at a time) onto the grill. Put the lid down and wait about 2 minutes. Check to see if they are light to medium brown with grill marks. If they are, flip them over with some tongs. If not, let them cook a bit longer. Put the lid back down and allow them to brown on both sides. Remove from grill and put on your next batch.

Or, if you absolutely must use the oven, get you baking stone or cookie sheet hot in a 450 oven. Spray the stone down with water, then put the disks on it and bake them for about 3 1/2 minutes each.