You really knead to know how to make these easy flatbreads

Flatbread. A term used to describe hundreds of different breads, sometimes but not always unleavened, usually but not always made with wheat flour.

For some reason, when people take to baking bread at home, they most usually aim to produce a big fat sourdough or health loaf. This is in fact the most challenging bread to get right at home.

Flatbreads are a much easier choice. And they make more sense to perfect in the home kitchen: while the artisanal baking trend has resulted in the availability of many great buxom loaves (and too many annoying, tattooed hipster bakers), truly great flatbreads are scarce.

The wonderful Turkish restaurant down the drag from me made a brilliant bread, but alas they've just closed doors. The only good thing to come out of this, for our household, is that I've been forced to get a great flatbread recipe down pat.

This recipe - the best of all those I tried - makes something akin to a pita bread, but with more stretch and suppleness. Stuff them, eat them with dips and salads, or roll them extra-thin and use them as wraps.

It's an adaptation of a Paul Hollywood recipe; I've replaced half the water with milk or buttermilk. It's super easy, but requires a bit of planning ahead, for proving time.

While many have become wheat-intolerant as a fashion statement, there are those who really and genuinely can't put up with the stuff.

It may well be, some theorise, that it's the sort of wheat we're eating which is the problem, so just in case, use a stone-ground, non-GMO flour in your flatbreads.

EASY FLATBREAD RECIPE

Makes: 12 - 14 flatbreads

Ingredients:

500g stoneground white bread flour

10g instant yeast

150ml milk or buttermilk

30g unsalted butter (or olive oil)

Roughly 150ml water

10g salt

Olive oil or ghee, for frying

Method:

1. Place the flour, yeast and milk/buttermilk in large bowl.

2. Add the softened butter and most of the water, and mix with your hands or a wooden spoon.

3. Add the salt, and then gradually the remaining water, or the amount you need to get a soft dough that holds it shape.

4. Place on a floured board and knead for about 10 minutes (this will feel like 2½ hours but is therapeutic and gives you nice arms).

5. Place the now silky dough back in the bowl, cover bowl with a damp towel and leave for between an hour and half a day.

6. When doubled in size, knock back down, and shape into 12 to 14 balls with floured hands.

7. Roll and stretch each ball until you have a pan-sized bread.

8. Heat olive oil or ghee in a pan and fry each flatbread on high, so that you have blistered blackened welts on both surfaces. Keep under a dry kitchen towel while you cook the rest.

• This article was originally published in The Times.