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Arayes are a meat-stuffed pita that is popular in Middle Eastern cuisine. They are usually stuffed with minced meat like beef or lamb, along with a combination of aromatic seasonings and spices. Think of them as a better, Middle Eastern version of a pizza pocket. These are so tasty and your whole family will love them (even the picky eaters).
Why You’ll Love Arayes
- Easy: With a few simple ingredients you’ll have this recipe whipped up in only 35 minutes
- Kid-Friendly: Arayes are kid-friendly and the perfect grab-and-go option for an after-school snack or quick lunch
- Versatile: You can stuff these pitas with whatever your fav minced meat is. Add veggies, spices, herbs, whatever you want
Ingredients
Beef – For this recipe, I used ground beef, however, you can use your favorite minced meat. Use lean ground beef for a less-fatty or greasy protein
Mint – One of the fresh herbs in this recipe is mint and I find it gives this unique, delicious freshness to this recipe. However, you can easily swap mint for something like basil or another herb you have on hand. It’ll just give a different flavor
How to Make Arayes
- Make the meat filling: combine the beef, grated onion, grated garlic, garlic powder, onion powder, salt, pepper, fresh mint and chili flakes in a bowl and mix well with your hands or a spatula to combine.
- Divide the meat filling into 6 portions. Shape each portion into a semi-circle that’s just a bit smaller than half of a pita. Carefully open each pita half and put a flattened portion of meat into each. Close the pita and gently press to make the pita flat, the meat filling should be a half-inch thick. *Note: depending on the size of pita you use, you may have more or less portions. Simply use up the beef filling between as many pita halves as needed.
- Cook the pitas: Place a pan on medium heat and add a drizzle of olive oil. When the pan is hot add 2 pita halves and cook for 4-5 minutes per side until golden and crispy, pressing down slightly on each side as the pita halves cook. Repeat until all pita halves have been cooked, adding more olive oil to the pan as needed.
- Serve pita halves with lemon wedges for squeezing lemon juice over top, a pinch of fresh minced parsley and tzatziki sauce for dipping.
Tips and Tricks
- Depending on the size of the pita you use, you may have more or fewer portions. Simply use up the beef filling between as many pita halves as needed
- This recipe is great for sharing! Cut the cooked pita halves in half once more and serve on a platter as an appetizer with tzatziki for dipping
Variations
- Veggies: This can be a great recipe to hide some veggies in the minced meat stuffing and have your picky eaters gobble them up. Cut them up small or blitz them in your food processor. Things like carrots, celery, or even cauliflower can all go great into these
- Meat: Swap the ground beef for a leaner protein like ground turkey or chicken in the recipe below
Chicken Arayes
- Make the meat filling: combine the feta, ground chicken, grated onion, grated garlic, salt, pepper, fresh mint, fresh basil and minced jalapeno in a bowl and mix well with your hands or a spatula to combine.
- Divide the meat filling into 6 portions. Shape each portion into a semi-circle that’s just a bit smaller than half of a pita. Carefully open each pita half and put a flattened portion of meat into each. Close the pita and gently press to make the pita flat.
- *Note: depending on the size of pita you use, you may have more or less portions. Simply use up the beef filling between as many pita halves as needed.
- Cook the pitas: Place a pan on medium heat and add a drizzle of olive oil. When the pan is hot add 2 pita halves and cook for 4-5 minutes per side until golden and crispy, pressing down slightly on each side as the pita halves cook, cooking until the chicken is done at 165F. Repeat until all pita halves have been cooked, adding more olive oil to the pan as needed.
- Serve pita halves with lemon wedges for squeezing lemon juice over top, a pinch of fresh minced parsley and tzatziki sauce for dipping.
Best served with
- Tzatziki (I know it’s not Middle Eastern but it still is a yummy dip to dip these into)
- Vegetarian Chopped Green Salad
How to Store Leftovers
These are best fresh but you can store leftovers in the fridge and reheat in the oven or toaster. You can also freeze these for a quick and easy lunch. Just thaw them, re-heat them, and voila!
Common Questions
What are arayes?
A classic Middle Eastern street food consisting of pita bread stuffed with spiced, minced meat and grilled or baked so they are crisp and golden on the outside.
Do I need to use fresh mint?
Fresh mint gives a unique and delicious flavor to the meat in this recipe. I’d opt for fresh vs. dried for the best flavor.
Save this recipe for later
Servings: pita halves
Ingredients
For the beef filling
- 1 lb lean ground beef
- 1 small-medium yellow onion, grated
- 2 garlic cloves, grated or pressed
- 1 tbsp garlic powder
- 1 tbsp onion powder
- 2 tsp salt
- ½ tsp pepper
- 6 tbsp fresh minced mint
- ¼ tsp chili flakes
For serving
- lemon wedges
- 1-2 tbsp fresh minced parsley
- 1/2-1 cup tzatziki , (use our easy greek tzatziki recipe)
Variation: Chicken Arayes
- 3 pitas (5-6 inches in diameter), halved
- 1 lb ground chicken
- ½ cup crumbled feta cheese
- 1 small-medium red onion, grated
- 4 garlic cloves, pressed
- 1 ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp ground pepper
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- zest from one lemon
- 4 tbsp minced fresh mint
- 2 tbsp minced fresh basil
- 1 jalapeno (seeds removed), minced
- serve with: lemon wedges, fresh basil or mint for garnish, tzatziki, (use our easy greek tzatziki recipe)
Instructions
Start Cooking- Make the meat filling: combine the beef, grated onion, grated garlic, garlic powder, onion powder, salt, pepper, olive oil, lemon zest, fresh mint, fresh basil and diced jalapeno in a bowl and mix well with your hands or a spatula to combine.
- Divide the meat filling into 6 portions. Shape each portion into a semi-circle that’s just a bit smaller than half of a pita.
- Carefully open each pita half and put a flattened portion of meat into each. Close the pita and gently press to make the pita flat, the meat filling should be a half-inch thick.*Note: depending on the size of pita you use, you may have more or less portions. Simply use up the beef filling between as many pita halves as needed.
- Cook the pitas: Place a pan on medium heat and add a drizzle of olive oil. When the pan is hot add 2 pita halves and cook for 4-5 minutes per side until golden and crispy, pressing down slightly on each side as the pita halves cook. Repeat until all pita halves have been cooked, adding more olive oil to the pan as needed.
- Serve pita halves with lemon wedges for squeezing lemon juice over top, a pinch of fresh minced parsley and tzatziki sauce for dipping.
Variation: Chicken Arayes
- Make the meat filling: combine the feta, ground chicken, grated onion, grated garlic, salt, pepper, fresh mint, fresh basil and minced jalapeno in a bowl and mix well with your hands or a spatula to combine.
- Divide the meat filling into 6 portions. Shape each portion into a semi-circle that’s just a bit smaller than half of a pita. Carefully open each pita half and put a flattened portion of meat into each. Close the pita and gently press to make the pita flat.
- *Note: depending on the size of pita you use, you may have more or less portions. Simply use up the beef filling between as many pita halves as needed.
- Cook the pitas: Place a pan on medium heat and add a drizzle of olive oil. When the pan is hot add 2 pita halves and cook for 4-5 minutes per side until golden and crispy, pressing down slightly on each side as the pita halves cook, cooking until the chicken is done at 165F. Repeat until all pita halves have been cooked, adding more olive oil to the pan as needed.
- Serve pita halves with lemon wedges for squeezing lemon juice over top, a pinch of fresh minced parsley and tzatziki sauce for dipping.
Notes
- Depending on the size of pita you use, you may have more or less portions. Simply use up the beef filling between as many pita halves as needed.
- This recipe is great for sharing! Cut the cooked pita halves in half once more and serve on a platter as an appetizer with tzatziki for dipping.
- If you love the flavours of this recipe you’re sure to love our Greek Meatball Recipe (Keftedes)
Maria Koutsogiannia
Maria is the creator of FoodByMaria and your go-to Greek food expert for cozy, flavor-packed recipes. Inspired by her Mediterranean roots, she brings traditional Greek flavors, feel-good ingredients, and a whole lot of joy to everyday cooking.
61 people are discussing this recipe. Join in
Great recipe, my boyfriend ate a whole plate and i couldn’t even take a photo of what I created 😅😁
hahahahah this is hilarious! PATIENCE BOYFRIEND
I made this for dinner, my son and I loved them. The leftovers the next day were even better.
love to hear it!!!!
Made these tonight for dinner using a turkey/lamb mix and was absolutely blown away! The pita is super crispy which balances the flavourful filling perfectly. It was also super quick to make and you can prep the meat and freeze it to speed up the process/meal prep.
thank you so much sweetheart for the love!!!
I made this recipe tonight for dinner with lamb as the meat, it came out amazing! So much flavor and paired perfect with tzatziki. Even my 5yr old loved it.. will certainly be making this again 🙂
Thank you so much for the love, hun!
Can I use your Fluffy Greek Pita recipe for these? I’m thinking of making this tonight or tomorrow – they look amazing!
I think I could use my 2 ingredient pitas instead! The fluffy pita recipe doesn’t turn into a pita pocket!
I typically do not give a recipe five out of five for the first go round without small adjustments of my own.
This one I do.
My husband had one con and it was greasy. That could’ve been that his was the last one made there was too much oil wrong type of meat. The list could go on.
I will continue to make this with minimal tweaks to the recipe which is huge for me. It had so much flavor and depth. It was good cold the next day.
The filling for this would be great to make in advance and let those flavors develop if you like meal prepping. I made the Tzatziki on Thursday and made the dish itself on Saturday so the tzatziki was perfect.
I just wish that I would have bought pita bread with the pocket because I had to cut them open and that was a pain but that was my doing.
Thank you for popping up on my IG 🤤🤤
Thank you so much for the love, Hayden!!
Did the beef version and it was delicious. The flavour was great. The entire recipe is quick and easy.
Thank you so much for the love, Ellen!!!!!
This recipe was amazingggg, all my family loved it and they even made me make it for them again! We did the chicken ones!
Thank you so much, Caroline!!!!
Made the chicken version for dinner last night. 10000/10 recommend. Delish seasonings. Used dried herbs (mint and basil)and still tasted delish. Huge hit with kids and hubby. 100% would make again.
Thank you so much for the continue support hun!!!
Honestly the best things I’ve tasted in years. Absolutely delicious. Easy to make and perfect for the big family. I made these and posted only insta and I’ve been flooded with comment asking so I’ve passed the recipe and “foodbymaria” on to everyone who’s asked. Incredible
THANK YOU SO MUCH DOMINIC!!!!!!
MARIA- holy moly, I made these with lamb and just about fell out of my seat after dinking them into my own tzatziki- so ridiculously delicious, that I just shared with my foodie brother who also enjoys learning about and cooking world flavors. I just cannot get over how many gustatory boxes this ticked for me with lamb as spiced& seasoned. We will enjoy this again and again, as I know my 23 year old twins will when they are back for a weekend visit. Thank you so very much- just delightful!
This makes me soooo happy!!!!! Thank you so much for the love. Please let me know if you try any other of my recipes!!!!