Freezing Unbaked Pitas
I was inspired by a question by someone in another bread forum and my own recent discovery and love affair with baking pita. In the other forum, the person had frozen shaped bread dough and then was having problems reviving it. I wondered if she could make pitas with it. While that question remains unanswered, I tried a related experiment.
I picked a nice basic bread recipe - in this case, an adaptation of Bernard Clayton's Rosemary-Garlic Bread on page 464 of my edition. The recipe calls for about half whole wheat flour and half white flour, and I, of course, used all whole wheat. I also, as usual, used considerably less than the 2 packets of yeast - possibly a teaspoon, but I don't remember. And I'm sure I stuck it in the refrigerator for a good part of its early life. It's been a couple weeks. But that's my modus operandi.
I divided the dough into twenty-four equal balls, which would make them smaller than might have been called for (for about six cups of flour for two standard loaves). I then rolled the balls to 1/8 inch thickness, using those rubber bands I found online (Fanta, I think) for my rolling pin. And I managed to freeze them by placing them in the freezer on non-stick cookie sheets for a couple hours and then stacking them and putting them in freezer bags. (A smaller quantity would have made the logistics of this step a bit simpler.)
I now take them out two at a time and bake them in my Oster countertop convection oven. Today I had my greatest success so far. I placed the frozen pitas between two sheets of parchment paper on top of the oven with an inch or so of space between the oven and the pitas. I then pre-heated the oven to 450 (its top temperature) with my little toaster-oven baking stone in the middle for about half an hour. Then I placed one piece of parchment and the pitas on the stone. In less than two minutes the pitas were big round balls.
Sorry, no pictures. All gone. Maybe next time. I still have plenty more from this batch to experiment with.
Rosalie
Comments
Rosalie,
That sounds like a great idea. For as easy as Pita sounds, to me it is a project that I don't make often. When I do it seems like we end up tossing a few of the baked ones out a few days later. And Pita is so good made at home I would really like to make them more often.
Rosemary-Garlic, now your teasing me. That really is a fantastic sounding Pita. Thanks so much for bringing this idea to the table.
Eric
Thanks, Eric. Coming from you, that's a real compliment.
Of course, it's just an idea for you to riff off of.
Rosalie