These Pita Pocket Sandwiches make for an easy lunch, dinner or late-night snack. (Alex Gallegos/for The Gazette)

The Gazette offers audio versions of articles using Instaread. Some words may be mispronounced.

Inspiration can come from anywhere. Sometimes it’s a common dish that I want to leave my own mark on. Sometimes it’s an elegant, skillful meal I have seen a professional make and want to see if I can recreate myself. And sometimes, inspiration strikes late at night at a Love’s Travel Stop in Morris, Illinois.

I pulled in for some gas at 8 p.m. about a month and a half ago, on my way back from visiting friends in Michigan, and realized two things. One, I hadn’t eaten dinner yet, and two, it would be another 3 hours before I got home. I’d had a sandwich that was similar to this Pita Pocket Sandwich, and when I got home, I checked to see where I could get one close to me. Unfortunately, the answer is that there’s no location near me. Unwilling to seek out franchise opportunities, I instead turned to my kitchen, deciding I could make my own version of the same thing.

Recipe

Pita Pocket Sandwiches

Prep time: 30 minutes

Cook time: 30 minutes

Serves 6

Ingredients

1 1/2 pounds boneless skinless chicken breast

1 tablespoon lemon pepper

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 pinch salt

1 cup basmati rice

1 teaspoon turmeric

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 1/2 cups chicken broth or hot water

1 cup pickled red onion

8 Kosher dill baby whole pickles, sliced thick

1/2 teaspoon sumac

2 tablespoons tahini

2 tablespoons lemon

Pinch salt

1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1 tablespoon hot sauce of your choice

6 pita pockets

Hummus

Directions

Rub the chicken in the lemon pepper and salt, coating evenly. Cook chicken using your desired method (I prefer sous vide, but baked or grilled are just fine as well), and cut into bite-sized cubes.

In a pot with a tight-fitting lid, put the olive oil, salt, rice, turmeric, garlic powder and chicken broth. Heat to boiling. As soon as the liquid boils, put on the lid and turn the heat on the burner as low as it will go. Cook 15 minutes, then remove the pot from the heat and let steam 5 more minutes before removing the lid and fluffing with a fork.

Toss pickled red onions with sumac powder to evenly coat.

Mix tahini, lemon juice, salt, paprika, garlic powder and hot sauce of your choice to make a sauce.

To assemble, warm pita pockets for 30 seconds in microwave. Cut in half. Line inside of pocket with a thin spread of hummus. Fill pockets with rice, chicken, onions and pickles, then drizzle with your spicy tahini sauce.

Source: Alex Gallegos

The technique for rice is the same one I always use to make amazing basmati rice, by the way. You can add the extra flavorings, but if you want plain rice, it works just fine with just the rice, water and salt as well. This process is as much about using steam as it is about applying heat directly, so make sure that lid is really tight (add a square of aluminum foil to help seal the lid on if you want to make it even tighter), and don’t open the lid before the final 5-minute steam. If you let all that water vapor out of the pot right then, you might as well start over.

Finally for the hummus, you can use homemade if you have a recipe you really like (you’ll have tahini on hand for the sauce anyway) but if not, then store bought is perfectly fine for this application as well. Maybe someday I’ll have a hummus recipe for this column — but not today.

Alex Gallegos is an enthusiastic home cook who enjoys trying new recipes and learning new techniques. Find this recipe and others like it at PlatefulsOfFlavors.com.