Pita Bread

On Sunday, we had a few friends over for lunch. It was just a couple (no kiddies), so I was able to make whatever I wanted without thinking of a simpler, kid-friendly variation. The couple are a very sweet Japanese woman and a wonderful American man, whom we have only met one other time. I was planning on making Mexican food, but then I remembered that the man grew up in Florida where there is an abundance of Latin food - what if mine didn't measure up? Instead I settled on a Morrocan chicken dish, couscous, a Morrocan salad, hummus and homemade pita bread.

As per usual, I made the dough in my bread maker and then took it out to make into eight balls. After those sat for a little while, I rolled them out into a shape that kind of resembled a circle drawn by K.

Once they were all rolled out, they had to rise for 40 minutes.

At the end of the 40 minutes, exactly half of them were still quite flat.

And the other half rose to about a centimeter. I was a bit concerned, but figured that there were only to be four of us (plus K who was certainly not going to eat this), so at least we could each have one that rose a bit.

After pulling them out of the oven, however, I was super surprised to see that all of them had puffed up nicely. They looked beautiful! I expected them to fall down so they are flat, but have an opening, like the ones we buy at the grocery store, but that never happened.

 

I made them the night before our guests came and the next day they were still all puffy. Wahoo!!!

 

 

As the guests arrived, I started plating our lunches. The dude looks at the hummus and asks, "is that hummus?" Good, I thought, at least he is somewhat familiar with the food - hopefully he doesn't hate Middle Eastern/North African food. He then tells his girlfriend that I had made hummus and she too seemed quite stoked. Yay! As I plated the couscous and chicken, the dude's face looked even more surprised. Then he asks, "Did you know that I was born in Jordan? I'm half Arabic."

 

Uhhhh, no, I most certainly did not know that. I decided not to do Mexican food as he might be too familiar with it and it might not live up to expectations. Instead I choose to do the cuisine of his mother's home. He must have grown up with all of this. Needless to say, this had me quite nervous. Luckily, either it really was good, or he is extremely kind because he complimented the dishes numerous times. Thank goodness!!