The Best Pita Bread and Garlic Sauce (Toum) Recipes
Living in Michigan, freshly made pita bread and garlic sauce is usually as close as a quarter mile away wherever you are at any given time. We have a large population of residents of Middle Eastern descent and there’s a good number of restaurants that serve delectable Middle Eastern cuisine. My favorite, garlic sauce and pita bread. It’s a beautiful thing.
I love, love, love pita bread and garlic sauce! It occurred to me the hard way to not love it so much at lunch time when you have to return to the office and/or lead a meeting. But occasionally, I’ll throw caution to the wind – and it’s always worth it. If you’ve never had it, garlic sauce as you might guess, can be quite pungent and the aroma has a tendency to want to hang around. I mean it is garlic, after all.
If you love it as much as I do, it’s hard to resist slathering warm pita with a shmear of thick, creamy, garlic sauce. If you’re not careful, it is very easy to down one after another and another and get too full to have an entree’.
It’s Tricky
And, if you love it like that, finding the best recipe to make it when you want it is the next logical step. I learned that while it only uses four simple ingredients, making garlic sauce can be a little tricky to master. I’ve made it a few times. The first time, it was an unmitigated, oily mess. It didn’t occur to me that I could have just held on to that epic failure to add it in other dishes to great success. Instead, I trashed that disappointment without a second thought.
I had a little more success the second time around but, not by much. But I learned since my second attempt though, that adding a little cooked, mashed potato into the sauce to thicken it up some can offer up a bit of redemption. Makes sense I guess, but that bit of intel was about a year and a half too late. Also, while the taste of boiled potato is pretty neutral, it still seems to me that it would alter the flavor of the sauce.
Sometimes It Takes a Little Practice (For Me)
The third time was the charm, I nailed it! No yogurt or boiled potatoes necessary. All I needed to do was slow down. Who knew? Well, apparently everyone that successfully makes garlic sauce knew. If the emulsion doesn’t come together or breaks, you’re not going to have a successful sauce. Garlic sauce will not be rushed.
I would also recommend that if you dream of the creamy, snow white garlic sauce that’s served in restaurants, don’t use grapeseed oil. I did that so you don’t have to. Grapeseed oil has a green tint. While that’s ok and the sauce turned out fine; it was still delicious, I was forced by the perfectionist in me to make it again just to get the lily white result I expected. This time I used canola oil. Grapeseed oil will still yield a tasty sauce but, it was the aesthetics that drove me nuts.
Most of the recipes you’ll find on the internet have the four basic ingredients that make an outstanding sauce: salt, oil, lemon and garlic. Fresh garlic. But it was the one ingredient that was never listed on any recipe that eluded me, and it was patience. Hardly anyone tells you about that fifth ingredient but, Yumna at Feel Good Foodie does and this is where we found this delicious toum recipe.
Take it Slow
Rushing through the process could result in a disastrous, soupy sauce. Then you’ll have to try to remediate it with boiled potatoes or yogurt. Nobody wants that. Adding the oil very s-l-o-w-l-y and alternating with the lemon juice is the key. The lemon juice helps to combine and emulsify the sauce and prevents the oil from overpowering the garlic.
Greek yogurt is helpful to thicken it up a bit if needed and will tamp down the sharp taste of garlic if it’s too strong for your taste. You can also soak your garlic cloves in cold water for about 45 minutes to help cut the sharpness. The flavor of the garlic sauce will also mellow out after a day or so in the refrigerator.
Pita bread
Jump to Recipe
It’s hard to resist warm pita bread straight from the oven. Just like garlic sauce, pita has very few ingredients but, it is sooo freakin’ good! Watching it puff up in the oven creating pockets perfect for hummus, garlic sauce, shawarma or tabouli is like magic.
I find that of all the bread recipes I’ve made over the years, this is one of the easiest. Usually the recipes I make call for active dry yeast. This recipe calls for instant yeast but you can use active dry yeast if that’s what you have on hand. You will have to proof it before adding it to the recipe. The upside is there is no kneading this dough. And, you don’t need a mixer.
This is Not Your Run of the Mill Grocery Store Pita
Another upside is that you probably already have all the ingredients on hand and it’s so easy that making a few pita loaves is pretty much a slam dunk.
If you have a pizza stone or steel, that’s great. You can cook the loaves directly on the stone or steel. If you don’t have either of these, no worries. You can cook the bread in a cast iron skillet in the oven.
I’ve made this bread recipe a couple times after trying a different recipe. I prefer this recipe. My pita remained a little light in color, even when I flipped them to get a little color but, it was still delicious.
It does not make a pita loaf that you’d find in the grocery store. I hesitate to disparage grocery store pita because it is exactly the same as the pita you find in the Coney Islands here in Michigan. They taste ok but not like homemade.
Cook It Now, or Later
If you’re planning to cook it later, you can store the mixed dough in the refrigerator. After letting it rise for about 1-½ hour, punch it down, cover with cling wrap and sit it in the refrigerator overnight. You can also portion out the dough into balls and keep it in the refrigerator for a day as well, just seal it so it doesn’t form a crust.
How long does it last? About 3 days in a tightly sealed container. You can also freeze the pita loaves for up to three months. The pita bread recipe is adapted from Alexandra’s Kitchen and was the best and easiest one I’ve found.
Both the garlic sauce and pita bread are a great treat that’s easy to make for a few or for a crowd and is a perfect anytime snack.
Garlic Sauce (Toum)
Equipment
- mini food processor
Ingredients
Garlic Sauce
- 1/2 cup peeled garlic cloves, sliced length-wise with germ removed
- 1-½ cup Canola, safflower or any neutral oil
- ¼ cup Lemon juice
- 1 tsp Kosher salt
Instructions
Garlic Sauce
- Slice each garlic clove length-wise and remove the green germ in the center of the clove, if visible.
- Add sliced garlic and salt to food processor and blend until finely minced, for a about a minute, scrapping down the sides of the bowl.
- With food processor running, slowly pour one to two tablespoons of oil, stopping to scrape down sides of bowl occasionally. Pour one or two more tablespoons of oil and process until sauce becomes emulsified.
- Continuing with food processor running, add one teaspoon of lemon juice. Continue adding oil and lemon juice by the tablespoon and teaspoon respectively, alternating between the two until all of the oil and juice have been added. This process should take about 20 minutes.
- Transfer sauce to a glass container with a tight seal and refrigerate. Sauce should last up to three months.
Pita Bread
Equipment
- pizza stone or baking steel (optional) or cast iron skillet
Ingredients
- 2 cups All-purpose flour (plus more for sprinkling)
- 1 tsp Kosher salt
- ¾ cup Warm water (110-115°F)
- 1 tbsp Olive oil (plus 1 tsp)
Instructions
- In a large bowl, whisk together flour, salt and instant yeast.
- Add water and one tablespoon of olive oil. Stir until combined and dough begins to form.
- Knead dough just until flour is absorbed and form into a ball.
- Drizzle extra olive oil over top of dough ball. Turn over making sure entire ball is coated with oil. Cover with kitchen towel or cling wrap. Move to a warm place and let rise for 1.5 hours.
- After dough has risen to about double it's original size, turn out on lightly floured surface and knead into a ball.
- Preheat oven to 550° F. Heat pizza stone or baking steel according to manufacturer's directions. If you're using a cast iron skillet, heat skillet for at least 5 minutes before baking.
- Divide ball into six equal pieces. Roll each portion into a ball, using flour to prevent sticking. Let balls rest for 30 minutes.
- Flatten a ball and using a rolling pin, gently roll out until it becomes a 6-inch round. Repeat with remaining dough balls.
- Let rounds rest for about 15 minutes.
- Using a pizza peel or spatula, slide flattened dough rounds onto pizza stone, baking stone or skillet. If using a skillet you'll bake one pita at a time. If using a pizza stone or steel, you can cook 2-3 rounds at a time.
- Bake for2 minutes or until golden brown. Repeat with remaining dough rounds.
- Pita can be stored in an airtight container for about 3 days.