Kıbrıs Pidesi (Cypriot Pitta Bread) is a traditional Northern Cypriot recipe for a classic dip or sauce made from a blend of yoghurt, garlic, cucumber and mint leaves. The full recipe is presented here and I hope you enjoy this classic Northern Cypriot version of: Cypriot Pitta Bread (Kıbrıs Pidesi).
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Beautiful, soft and puffy, pitta bread pockets, ready to fill up with whatever comes off the mangal. This has been such a fab pastime with the kids over the past few weeks. I usually don’t bother making them myself as my local turkish grocers sells them (but I haven’t been there in over 2 months) and they are so easy to just pick up and fill with grilled hellim (halloumi cheese) or bbq kebab, but the homemade flavour and texture, like most things, is just amazing.
Combine the lukewarm water and milk in a jug, then stir in the sugar to dissolve before mixing in the yeast. Set aside, covered for 5-10 mins until the mixture activates and becomes frothy.
Sift together the flour and salt into a large bowl, then form a well in the centre. Stir the oil into in the liquid/yeast mixture and pour it all into the well in the flour then use your fingers to bring everything together. Turn out onto a floured work surface (add a little extra flour for dusting if necessary) and knead for a 8-10 minutes, until the dough is smooth and elastic. Shape the dough into a ball then transfer to a bowl greased with a little olive oil. Turn the dough in the bowl to coat then cover the bowl with clingfilm and set aside in a warm place to prove for an hour.
After an hour, take the dough out of the bowl and weigh it (it should typically weigh about 800g) then divide into eight equal portions of 100g.
At this point, pre-heat your oven to its hottest setting now (mine goes up to 240C fan) and lay an upturned baking tray at the bottom of the oven ready to sit the flatbreads on.
Once you have divided the dough into 8 equal pieces, roll them into smooth balls. Arrange these on a tray, cover with greased clingfilm and set aside to prove for 20 minutes further.
After 20 mins, your oven will be super hot, so very lightly flour your work surface and with a rolling pin, roll out each of the balls into a long oval shape (about 20 x 10cm). If you roll them out too thin they might go too crispy and could be a little hard to split and stuff your kebab into.
Usually you'll be able to bake 2 pide at a time on the upturned baking tray in the oven base.
Lay two of the uncooked pide on a flat tray or large board and quickly and carefully transfer them to the upturned hot baking tray at the bottom of the oven and quickly close the oven door. Set your timer for 2 mins 30 secs (they usually take anything from 2-3 minutes to cook and puff up, so keep an eye on them), once they have puffed up and have been in the oven for around 2 1/2 mins, quickly open the oven door and carefully turn them over for another 30 seconds to 1 min, then take them out, wrap them in the clean tea towel, then repeat the cooking process with the 4 remaining pitta.
Store the cooked pide in a clean tea towel to keep warm as you bake the remainder. If preparing these to use with kebabs, re-heat the pide quickly on your barbecue's grill before serving.
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