Ping Gai Chicken - Laotian "Grilled Chicken Chicken"

There’s no way to prove that corporate pizza chain restaurants got the idea for stuffing their crusts with cheese from Khachapuri, but that’s definitely the story I’m going with. 

Nevertheless, this Georgian cheese bread is such an amazing treat, it’s probably only a matter of time before these things are being delivered all over the country, right along side the usual pizza, garlic knots, and chicken wings.

While they do take a little bit of finesse to pull off at home, the dough is very simple, and the pay off is well worth the effort. You can obviously customize the cheese blend, but I strongly suggest that feta be part of the equation. The stretchy mozzarella, and creamy Jack are nice, but they’re not the most flavorful cheeses ever, which is why the sharper bite the feta brings works so well.

Besides working with the wet, sticky dough, the only real challenge here is not over cooking your eggs. In fact, I have it on good authority that some folks don’t even place these back in the oven after the eggs are introduced, but rather just stir the raw egg into the molten hot, cheesy center, and “cook” it that way. That’s up to you, but the point is, we want…we need, a runny yolk here. Anyway, since you can’t get this delivered quite yet, I really do hope you give these gorgeous Khachapuri a try soon. Enjoy!

Ingredients for 2 Khachapuri:

For the dough:

1/2 cup warm milk

1/3 cup warm water

1 package dry active yeast (2 teaspoons)

1 1/2 teaspoons sugar

2 teaspoons olive oil

2 cups all-purpose flour, plus about 1/4 to 1/2 cup extra for final kneading

1 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt (3/4 teaspoon fine salt)

For the cheese blend:

4 ounces mozzarella cheese

4 ounces Monterey Jack cheese

8 ounces feta cheese

For the rest:

1 tablespoon butter, cut in 4 slices

2 large eggs

sea salt for the top

cayenne, optional

- Bake at 475 F. for 15 minutes, fill with egg, and bake another 3 or 4 minutes, until the egg is almost, but not quite set.

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