Recipe for Arabic Pita Bread

Recipe Break: Arab Pita Bread
September 30, 2002

Hi everyone,

Aunt Dar and I put together a Palestinian dinner party for Iowa City friends this past weekend and it was a smashing success. The 20 or so cook's helpers/taste testers scarfed down all but our bowl of backup rice. If you are as ambitious a cook as she is, let me know and we can plan a similar fete in your neck of the woods when I'm home next.

In the meantime, many people have asked me why their attempts at pita bread have not turned out as desired. I personally have had no idea until now. This recipe worked well for us, was reasonably entertaining, and the mistakes correctable. More recipes to follow.

Enjoy!

Hubbas (Arab Pita Bread) Makes 20, allow 3 hours or so prep (with nap breaks)

1 pkg active dry yeast large bowl
1T sugar small bowl
3 c. warm water rolling pin, board
1 T salt lots of towels/cloths
1 T oil plastic garbage bag, or newspapers
9 cups unsifted all purpose flour griddle or skillet

In a small bowl, combine yeast, sugar, and water. Let stand until bubbly (about five minutes). Stir in salt and oil.

Place all flour in a large bowl and make a well in the center. Pour in about half the yeast mixture at a time. Mix and knead by hand until flour and liquid hold together.

Turn dough out onto a well-floured board and shape into a log. Divide into 20 equal pieces. Place pieces of dough on the board and keep covered. To shape each loaf, place a piece of dough in a floured palm. With your other hand, pull dough out away from sides, then fold it back toward center and press in middle, work around edge until smooth and elastic. Place smooth side up on cloth-lined trays. Cover with dry cloth, then top with damp cloth, then let rise at room temp until puffy. (1 to 1 ½ hours)

One at a time place a ball on a floured board. With a rolling pin, flatten, then roll out from center with 4 strokes each way to make a 6-inch round. Shake off excess flour and place rounds at least ½ inch apart on a dry cloth. Cover with the dry and damp cloth again, top with plastic or newspaper, and let them rise again another hour.

Adjust oven rack to 2 inches above bottom. Preheat to 475 degrees.

On a griddle with minimal grease, set each piece of bread just long enough to sear one side. (Some toasty brown spots acceptable) Then flip onto ungreased baking sheets for 5-10 minutes in oven. (Three breads fit on my sheets at a time.) Keep the oven light on and pull up a chair because this is cool. They inflate like balloons! If some don't inflate, don't worry, just get a good bread knife and fake a pocket later. Take out and let cool on a towel. You can flatten them down later, and refrigerate or freeze extras. Just reheat them before serving, they taste better that way (also true with store-brought pita).

If you like whole wheat bread, use the recipe above, reducing all-purpose flour to 5 cups and adding 3 ½ cups whole wheat flour, and ½ cup wheat germ.

Re-entry Discombobulation

Re-entry Discombobulation
September 15, 2002

Hi everyone,

I am home again as of last night and am getting readjusted to life in the US. My most recent discovery has been that reverse culture shock becomes cumulative; it doesn't reset itself every three months! I have felt extremely disoriented since getting back. I actually flew in on Aug. 31, but spent the past week in Chicago at the office and in Indiana at the CPT full-timer's retreat. It was neat to meet all the Colombia team people, who we don't interact with much because fluent Spanish speakers are needed to stay on that project and not move around. They are also mostly younger people, as opposed to our mostly older team, so it was nice not to feel like the 'kid' for a while.

My Sundays got booked up within 24 hours of my being home. But I may be willing to take on a few more speaking engagements during the week. So far:

Th, Sept 19, Baptist women's group in Osage IA
Su, 22, Either MC Unitarians or CF Mennonites, then overnight with little brother Tom (surprise!) in Cedar Falls.
Mon, 23, display table at Wartburg. (Available for classes!)
Th-Sun 26-29, Iowa City, Su Unitarian church
Weds, Oct 2, MC NIACC classes and display table
Su-Sat, Oct 6-12, taking a trip somewhere I think having nothing to do with CPT.
Su Oct 13, Methodist Church, Des Moines


I'll try to work in as many visits as I can around that schedule. Otherwise, I plan to try piecing together a quilt, attending pottery studio, and maybe studying up on Iraq.

It looks like I'll be headed back out Oct. 22, and will not get back home again until March 10 or so this time. It'll be a longer time out than usual, but should still be okay. Lots will be happening.

Lots of people have been asking me if I still have any marks from my beating. Really, I'm okay. Think of a women's rugby match, only with a camera. Since I got to keep the camera, I consider that I won. I actually got worse injured in a nice friendly round among CPTers of a game we call 'Slaughter,' in which someone lost themselves for a moment and began twisting my arm off. Lots of ice and time to blow off steam helped out a lot though. It was a game designed to help peace activists get in touch with their inner capacity for violence, so they don't get too self-righteous, I guess. Well, yeah, we all got in touch. In this game, you have two teams with a ball and a basket. You have to get your ball into the other team's basket. Other than that, there are no rules. We played on carpet, and there were many nasty formidable cases of rug-burn. Three people pushed me out of bounds in the first two minutes of the game, but since there were no rules and my inner aggressive streak had just come out full force (meaning no way was I done with this game yet), I made a peace accord with the person who was out from the other team, and we both went back in. I then got the ball in the bucket, but people didn't think much of my attempts at civil disobedience and peacemaking. Oh well. My wrist got messed up in the second round. I was really bitter for a while but lost my anger when the guy realized later that I was carrying an ice pack around on his account and said he was sorry. It's hard to stay mad at a guy like him, especially when he's 70. Actually, he felt so bad I thought maybe I should ditch the ice so he'd feel better, but then common health sense kicked in and I was completely fine two days later.

After the retreat I came home via Madison and Dubuque. We went to support friends who were arrested for doing a public witness at a 'first-strike' nuclear transmitter during training last January. We then went to eat at an Indian restaurant and nargila parlor, only the nargila was $16 per pipe! I will wait until I get back to Hebron for my fifty-cent fix. Either that, or I start fundraising by opening my own parlor. I did however get my seminary 'fix' visiting my friend Liz at Wartburg in Dubuque. So glad I'm headed for sem after CPT. So glad I am not there just yet...but I guess I'd better start getting 'fixed' on my Hebrew and Greek when I come home on leave, or much pain and suffering lies ahead.

I bussed home on the 11th, but got to go to one memorial service in the morning at the seminary, and then one at my home church directly after getting off the bus. Then someone said there was an anti-war vigil in central park, so I went straight to that. So now there is a quite large picture of me on the front page of the paper with my head bowed over a candle, and fortunately the caption does not tell that my head is bowed simply because I didn't hear the 'amen' at the end of the prayer and was waiting for them to go on while everyone else sat up. Oops. At any rate, there was no need to tell anyone from around here that I'd made it back.

I always mean to write more in my group letter, but then forget it all when I sit down to type. In the meantime, I'll sign off for now...

Le Anne