[Sca-cooks] I pita the foo'

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

On Jan 28, 2009, at 6:12 PM, Johnna Holloway wrote:

> A quick search didn't reveal the use of two pieces of dough.

It occurs to me that you'd have to seal the edges together pretty well  
in order to guarantee that, in baking, steam would build up inside and  
pull the halves apart to give you that pocket shape, and I confess  
that in my limited experience, I haven't seen a pita that didn't look  
like the stretchy gluten membrane of rolled-out, raw dough was on the  
outside only... the inside has always had that bubbly, slightly ragged  
look -- what the Thomas's English Muffin people describe as nooks and  
crannies. To me, this suggests the pocket was formed during baking,  
not before.

On the other hand, it also occurs to me that the wheat pancakes often  
eaten with things like Peking Duck, Mu Shu Pork, etc., _are_ made of  
two disks of dough, oiled, sandwiched together, and rolled out again,  
and peeled apart after cooking. This is, of course, when they're  
handmade for that express purpose, and not simply flour tortillas or  
spring roll wrappers, which are commonly used in the takeout Chinese  
food industry.

No, I'm not distributing pancakes next year for New Year's... at least  
not as far as I know.

Adamantius






"Most men worry about their own bellies, and other people's souls,  
when we all ought to worry about our own souls, and other people's  
bellies."
			-- Rabbi Israel Salanter