This easy to make rosemary focaccia was the first bread I learned to make.
Total time 30 minutes preparation, 3 hours resting, 40 minutes baking.
Skill level: Novice
Focaccia is a wonderful, crispy olive oil dough bread that originated from Genova in Northern Italy. If Pizza dough and bread got married and had a child, Focaccia is that child. A bread representing a mattress with its dimples, it has a golden brown crispy crust with an aerated chewy crumb.
There are endless variations of flavourings you can add to the dough base (carmelised onions, rosemary, potatoes, garlic, olives, fruits, nuts. There are sweet and savoury versions. Always a hit as a starter at parties I come back time and again to this bread as it does not require much kneading and looks beautiful once baked.
Ingredients
500 g Plain bread flour
350 g Room temperature water + 1 cup of water separate
80 ml olive oil
10 g Salt
15 g Instant active yeast
5 g sugar
1/2 cup Fresh Rosemary leaves
Method
1. Mix 350 g water, sugar and yeast together in a large bowl and let it rest for 10 minutes
2. Add 500 g plain flour, 60 ml olive oil and salt into the bowl and mix in with your hands until a shaggy dough forms. Rest for 20 minutes.
3. Wet your hands, pinch the edges of the dough and fold into the centre of the dough. Do this all the way around the dough until you have a nice dough ball in the dough.
4. Prepare an oven tray (or cast iron pot) lining the bottom with baking paper.
5. Place the dough in the centre of the oven tray and leave rest (covered) for 2.5 hours until the dough has puffed up into double its size.
6. Preheat your oven to 230 degrees C on fan forced settings.
7. Using your fingers, put deep dimples in the dough and scatter rosemary leaves across the bread (in each dimple).
8. Mix the remaing 20ml of olive oil and cup of water together and brush the mix over the top of your dimpled dough.
9. Bake for 40 minutes in the oven at 230 Degrees C.
10. Take the bread out of the oven and place on a cooling rack for an hour.
12. Slice the focaccia and serve with extra virgin olive oil
Enjoy my friends! Send pictures if you make it and let me know what you think!
Adrian
