Homemade Pita Bread & Chicken Shawarma
Made From Scratch Bread Series - roll up your sleeves!
- Milk
- Wheat
When you have a little extra time (a great weekend project!), bake these from-scratch pita breads for the best shawarma ever! You’ll mix, rest, and roll out dough while marinating chicken in yogurt, garlic, and spices. Sauté the chicken with onion, and serve it with a tangy, juicy feta, cucumber, and tomato salad plus warm homemade pitas.
Ingredients
½ cup
Feta Cheese
(Contains: Milk)
1 unit
Red Onion
10 ounce
Diced Skinless Dark Meat Chicken
1 unit
Lemon
6 tablespoon
Yogurt
(Contains: Milk)
1 unit
Mini Cucumber
1 tablespoon
Shawarma Spice Blend
1 unit
Instant Yeast
1 unit
Tomato
1 teaspoon
Garlic Powder
2 cup
Flour
(Contains: Wheat)
Not included in your delivery
1 teaspoon (tsp)
Cooking Oil
½ teaspoon (tsp)
Sugar
1 tablespoon (tbsp)
Olive Oil
2 teaspoon (tsp)
Olive Oil
8 teaspoon (tsp)
Salt
teaspoon (tsp)
Black Pepper
Nutrition Values
Utensils
Cooking Steps
Wash and dry produce.
Place flour in a large bowl. Reserve 1/4 cup flour in a small bowl and set aside (reserve 1/2 cup flour for 4 servings) (TIP: Reserved flour will be used for rolling and forming in Steps 4 & 5).
In large bowl with flour, add 1 tsp yeast, 1 1/2 tsp salt, and 1/2 tsp sugar (2 tsp yeast, 1 TBSP salt, and 1 tsp sugar for 4). Whisk to combine.
Add 3/4 cup warm water (TIP: For the perfect water temperature to help activate the yeast, microwave 1/4 cup water until steaming, 60-90 seconds, then add 1/2 cup tap water) and 1 TBSP olive oil (1 ⅓ cups water and 2 TBSP olive oil for 4). Stir until the flour is absorbed and you have a sticky dough ball, about 30-60 seconds.
Drizzle top of dough with a drizzle of olive oil; turn dough to coat. Cover with a kitchen towel and let rise in a warm spot until dough has doubled, about 1 1/2 hours.
While dough is resting, Quarter cucumber lengthwise; slice into 1/4-inch-thick pieces. Dice tomato into 1/4-inch pieces. Halve, peel, and thinly slice onion; finely chop a few slices until you have 1 TBSP (2 TBSP for 4 servings). Quarter lemon.
In a second small bowl, combine cucumber, tomato, finely chopped red onion, feta, juice from 2 lemon wedges (juice from 1 whole lemon for 4), salt, and pepper. Stir to combine. Refrigerate salad until ready to serve.
Open package of chicken and drain off any excess liquid. In a medium bowl, combine chicken, shawarma spice, garlic powder, juice from remaining lemon wedges, 1 packet of yogurt, a drizzle olive oil, and ½ tsp salt. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to cook.
Once pita dough has doubled in size, adjust oven rack to middle position and place a baking sheet on the middle rack in the oven. Preheat oven with baking sheet to 500 degrees.
Cut parchment paper into six 6-inch x 6-inch small squares (twelve squares for 4 servings). Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured work surface using 1-2 TBSP of reserved flour. Knead briefly to form a ball. Divide the dough into 6 equal portions (12 portions for 4). Reform each portion into a ball. Cover with a kitchen towel and let rest 20 minutes.
Once dough balls have rested for 30 minutes, flatten one ball at a time, and, using remaining reserved flour as needed, gently roll out with a rolling pin until you have a 4-to-5-inch round, ¼-½-inch-thick (TIP: the key is to not roll too aggressively in order to prevent the air pockets from being forced out.) Transfer each round to a sheet of prepared parchment paper.
Once all 6 pitas are formed, carefully remove preheated baking sheet from oven. Carefully add 3 pitas with parchment paper to hot baking sheet. Carefully return to middle rack and bake pitas until puffy and golden brown, 5-8 minutes. Remove cooked pitas and repeat with remaining pitas. (TIP: Cover cooked pitas with kitchen towel to keep them warm until ready to serve.)
Once pitas are baked, heat a drizzle of oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add yogurt marinated chicken and any remaining marinade in a single layer; cook, stirring occasionally, until browned and cooked through, 6-8 minutes.
Serve warm pitas, shawarma chicken, cucumber salad, and remaining yogurt family style. Enjoy as a bowl, or halve pitas, carefully open the pockets, and fill with chicken, cucumber salad, and remaining yogurt.
Customer reviews
Review summary
Updated on Dec 2025- Flavor: Many loved the tasty shawarma chicken and delicious feta salad, though some found the spices mild.
- Ease of prep: Making pita from scratch was fun but time-consuming; clearer instructions on dough texture would help.
- Suggestions: Consider offering premade pita options for busy nights. Adjust flour-to-water ratio in pita recipe for better consistency.
- Portions: Some found the meal filling and satisfying, while others wanted more chicken or larger pitas.
- Cooking tips: Allow extra rising time for pitas; oil hands when kneading dough to prevent sticking 🍞.
Reviews from our home cooks
I LOVED learning how to make pita! I'm so pleased with how easy it was and how well it came out. I really love learning new techniques with Hello Fresh that I would never think to attempt on my own. Thank you for this recipe!
Sooo tasty! It said it was hard to make. But honestly pretty easy. The hardest part was the dough for the bread but the directions are written so well. I followed every detail and they came out perfect! The chicken and salad were quick to make and the spices on the chicken tasted amazing!!
I'm really enjoying trying new things on days that I have more time. It was fun to make these pitas. I've never attempted that before- but the directions were great- everything "rose" with the tips on the recipe. Very fun to put these together as sandwiches & delicious!
This meal was one of the best I've had. I had never made any type of bread before. I was a little intimidated at first, but found the instructions so easy to follow, which made it an ease. Couldn't wait to see this pop up in the meal selections again.
We've been talking about trying to make pita bread for a while, and this gave us the push to actually do so. And it worked great despite having to cook them in twos in the toaster oven at slightly lower temperature (big oven broke last week). A little better description of the dough texture at different stages might be beneficial, sister wasn't sure if she had it smooth enough before the first rise.
The seasoning, meat, and cucumber onion salad were delicious! We liked it more than the other shawarma recipes we've had in the past. The pitas from scratch though was a bit more time and effort than we care for a midweek meal but they did turn out good
Oops, we seemed to be missing the onion used for 2 separate parts of the meal. The flavors were great, recipe was easy even though it is rated as difficult. It does take time to make the bread but was 100% worth it. Definitely a filling meal.
Delicious and very authentic meal! Loved having fresh made bread with dinner...and the chicken shawarma was amazing!!!
First time making my own pita bread. Easy to follow directions and advice on how to make the dough rise faster was so much appreciated. They came out perfect! HF is the best!
This was fun! The dough recipe needs work though. the dough was WAY too sticky to work with, even after nearly two hours of proofing. I wound up needing to work in more flour to try to work with the dough at all, then I had to give up. Still, the pitas rose, cooked properly, & tasted great! The schwarma spiced chicken was great, & the feta salad was okay.
