Our house filling - ground beef, fresh coriander (1/2 cup chopped), fresh parsley (1/2 cup chopped), 2 cloves garlic, 1 onion minced, salt, black pepper, turmeric powder My mom used to make it in a panini press 🥹

I’ve been watching Chef John for many years, and I love that he says, cold fresh water. Like what kind of water does he think we’re using? Old stale water? Water from a swamp. You’re the best Chef John.

"First of all, I'll do the jokes," almost had me spew coffee out my nose, and the adding Judy Bloom made me smile! Thanks, Chef John!

As someone who made this dish for many years: Do yourselves a big favor and consider making more than 2 pieces per person. Trust me on this, I never met a person who ate only 2 halves! (including myself)!

I always have to watch till the end because I can’t miss Chef John’s outro… “and as always, enjoyyyy!” 🤩

Finding out this is a regular dish, this is one of those things where I say "Why am I just finding out about this NOW?" - this is everything I love!! I can't wait to try!

In Lebanon my family makes this open face. So you spread it on top of the pita and place it in the oven. The pita gets crispy and the meat gets a nice crisp around the edges. Once you take it out of the oven you squeeze a fresh lemon over the top and enjoy.

I used to work in a Lebanese restaurant that made these, except we added cherry sumac and a dash of cinnamon to the beef mixture, as well as a handful of toasted pine nuts. We (the staff) also experimented on our own stuffing with some extra onions, or tomatoes. It was very delicious, and I'd highly recommend trying to find or use cherry sumac in this, as well as pine nuts.

Welcome back Chef John, hope your vacation was a relaxing and memorable one 🙂

Chef John's voice is my ASMR

I've eaten food from all over the world but the food made by the Lebanese/Palestinians/Egyptians is just on another level 👌❤️ Cannot wait to try this!

We love you Chef John! On a more personal note; during the pandemic you really helped to demystify cooking for me--and I got to love cooking at home so much that 4 years after beginning my "learn to really cook" journey, I'm opening a restaurant!

I’m Lebanese and I approve 👍🏻❤️🇱🇧🇱🇧

As an Afghan I suggest dicing onion, tomato and cucumber with lemon or lime juice and opening the pita up and adding that in there. Probably have to cook the meat first if you want to do this though!

Looks delicious! I did notice that Chef John kept increasing the amount of sauce with each bite. My kind of man!

I started watching food wishes in lockdown spend months watching the video then life started again I’ve come back today and the nostalgia I feel is unreal I love it

I ate Aryas basically in every gulf country and egypt and it seems different but the same for every place you visit and all are awesome.

These have been popular here for a while. I'm used to pitas being thicker than this, that's probably why they'd have more meat, and also my friends usually make them on the grill. Great, fun food to eat.

just moved down the street from a lebanese place that has this, and it is AMAZING

Arayes look extremely delicious, but I've always been hesitant to try making them. Maybe this is a sign, thank you for the recipe Chef ❤

It's like a Middle Eastern quesadilla!

If you place the pita between 2 cutting boards when pressing, you can reliably avoid cracks and also exert more pressure. 👍👍

Chef, I hope you had a blast on vacation!! So glad youre back😋

I adore one-pan recipes. I am SO making this one. Brilliant! 💯

I'm glad I bought that package of grass fed, finished ground beef because a cheeseburger Arayes seems on the horizon. But, I love lamb so I foresee getting some of that, as well! Welcome back, CJ! By the way, I bought an 8 pound sack of CA oranges that came with 8 oranges meaning each orange was 1 pound! Softball sized oranges!

Omg I was about to make this. Stop reading my mind

Merci Chef John.

Aaaw... The Judy Bloom reference made me smile ❤

That looks incredible! Thanks so much!

What on earth these look delicious!!

Brilliant idea. Thank you!😊

These were so delicious! As always, Thanks Chef!

Thanks, Chef John, for introducing me to some amazing food. You always do a great job of making a recipe easy for novices like me to follow. I have to try this!

Love Arayas. Especially when they’re grilled

Fantastic! Chef ❤

I’m about to go full-nerd here but, as to the stuffing, I think it might work better if you took a pita to use as a guide and then cut a circle from parchment paper that’s slightly smaller than the pita itself. Then, you put a piece of plastic wrap over the circle of parchment to use as a template for how much meat should go into the pita. Then, you divide the meat into two semi-circles and the stuffing should fit into the pita halves fairly easily, I would think. Alternately, maybe try placing little balls of the mixture in all areas of the pita half, like down in the corners, etc. Then, when you press, you’re only pressing a little bit of the mixture at a time and there’s less chance of ripping the bread. The balls of stuffing will kind of spread out, meet in the middle and the entire pita will get an even layer.

Looks amazing thank you

Thanks for this !

Great pita idea, gives me some ideas for future dishes. Thanks.

Great idea

They look delicious 👍

This looks tasty. Thanks for sharing it!

This looks absolutely delicious Chef! I'd love to try it with Kafta filling. 😋

After all, you are the Bill and Ted of your meat stuffed pita bread.

This looks good! And also leaves lots of room for variation and experimentation too.

Got a bunch of pita on hand, I’m definitely going to try this!

omg i saw bisan posted this so ofc i had to make it LOL. will try your version now, chef

Magical

That is something i need to try

My Arayes is a little bit different. I usually include some kind of chopped nut (preferably pine nuts, although walnuts and pecans would also do), and I use smaller pitas and stuff them thick enough so that you could stand them on the exposed meat side. After tossing the prepared stuffed pitas with the meat, I toss it in olive oil and then bake it standing up on the exposed meat on the bottom rack of my oven. That gets me a nice toasting on the top, but a perfect and uniform crust below.

You are the BEST!

I'm going to try this with ground pork and Mexican seasonings.

Looks very tasty, given the spices it sort of reminds me of an american style taco meat quesadilla, but in a good way lol. I really like the idea of an italian style arayes as well, served with a bit of marinara on the side mmmm. I bet you could serve these with some golden rice too, not gonna lie I have made golden rice a dozen times since you posted that video, lord have mercy on my waistline.

Awesome recipe chef, please show Arabic Areeka recipe please 🥺 please

You're the best, Chef John!! Amazing bruh, I'm 100% making these

I tried this after seeing a video of middle eastern man say it was better than borgers. It is good, definitely worth trying.

We coat it with oil and then grill it over embers. Your method is good. You can cut it into quarters just before serving

Good stuff🎉✌️

This looks amazing. I feel like a cheese element of some kind may be worthwhile. Perhaps feta, or even manchego.

I’m definitely going to make these mmmmmmmm……

Nice.

YUMMMMM !

I've had this before from a local Lebanese bakery and it's fantastic. Definitely worth a go.

I made this (as I did many of Chef John's recipes/techniques). It was delicious, pitas crispy, meat flavorful (I changed the recipe a bit) sauce good. But my supermarket pitas soaked up a lot of oil. And I mean A LOT. I ended up making the pitas as per packaging instructions and filled them with the meat mixture that I pan fried. Not as crispy but also less oily.

Fresh pickled veggies on the side would be nice too 🤗

"It's well worth a few tears." Indeed.

Poetic culinary perfection!!!

It felt kismet when this popped up on my subscription feed since I'm making them tonight. I always feel more confident after seeing a Chef John video.

crispy flatbread, thin meat filling suitably spiced with a tangy yoghurt based dip? HELL YES !

There is a very fine line between this Lebanese recipe and the Mongolian Khushuur that my wife makes. I would suggest substituting finely chopped meat instead of ground. It adds an extra chew factor to it that blends with the crunchy texture of the wrapper.

I cut up a steak into small peices after I BBQ it. I toast the bread over the fire until golden brown. Cut in half put some steak and a garden salad=lettuce, tomato, cucumbers, onions, and red radish. I make a vinegarette=1cup apple cider vinegar, 1&1/2 cup olive oil, 1 tablespoon dry onion flakes, 1 tablespoon of dry garlic flakes, 2 tablespoon of horseradish mustard, a teaspoon of pepper a half teaspoon of salt. Wisk everything together except the oil. When well combined wisk the oil in slowly. For best results let sit over night refrigerated. I keep this on hand year round as this is also a good marinade.

Chef!!! I NEED you to cook m'beyu, an argentinian-paraguayan recipe, I think it may be an interesting flavor and texture to try, some people stuff it with ham & cheese (w/ afternoon tea or coffee), capresse stuffing, etc. Please give it a try!

I'm the Judy Blume of this bride and groom? Pretty sure I'm the *doom* of this bride and groom, but Arayes, here I come. Let's give you a try. Thanks, Chef!

Try adding sumac to the tahini sauce, also pot-set yogurt adds a great tang.

Can you make something Nicaraguan? That's my food wish. ❤

As I recall, the Arayas I've eaten in Lebanese restaurants also contained pine nuts.

it’s so delicious, with tee zay tee zai kai,

🤣🤣🤣yup Chef John they are definitely extra krispy!!

AKA The Levantine Quesadilla

I want to this stuffed with crab and cheese!

quite interesting recipe as compared to the classical recipe . adding one tea spoon of olive oil into the meat mix will greatly improve the spread and flavor

😂 Italian American me with falaffel waffle breath and a weak Middle Eastern game.... ok so kinda meatball with kinda Mexican spices cooked in pita, dipped in Greek sauce? Yup! Making tomorrow!

Looks very similar to a Turkish gozleme

Yummmmm, I a little ground meat with my spices! 🔥

Hello chef John. What kind of frying pan do you use?

I bet this would taste great with Chef John's filling of his Cheeseburger Garbage Bread

I was getting worried during that FDL test if we are only gonna get the fork scraping action and none of that fork tapping action..

CJ, can you please do some beef tongue and beef liver recipes?

Egg Foo Young video please!

Do you think it would be possible to do a tuna melt in pita bread?

😋🥰

"I PITA the fool" I have made this before, but I've never dared cooking the raw meat in the pita. It's just a little less stressful to fry up the meat first.

Not only the smaller containers look better on video, they take up less space in the fridge, so I too prefer the smallest container possible method haha

Finally an Arabic dish

Could these pitas be stuffed, brushed with olive oil and baked?

Has anyone tried making these yet? If so.. do they truly cook all the way through.. and.. can you recommend a side dish?

Does anybody have a link or name for this pan he used?

Could these be made on the grill, or would we lose fork-don’t-lie crispiness?

Huh. When I started watching, I fully expected the meat to be at least partially cooked before being put in the pita to brown the bread. I guess this way, you don't get the browning on the meat, but the upshot is that all the juices coming out soak into the pita.

I can't tell, does Chef John like cayenne pepper?