Month: January 2018

Focaccia! Getchya Focaccia hea! How to make a fabulous focaccia

How to make a fabulous slab of focaccia

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I love a good focaccia.

Focaccia may be one of the most forgiving breads. There is almost no way to hurt it. With a day of planning, you can make focaccia to portion and save for sandwiches for everyone. Now, that’s yum!

Ingredients

Poolish

Bread flour

Water

Sea Salt

Focaccia dough

Bread flour

Poolish

Sea salt

Instant yeast

Water

Extra virgin olive oil

Notes about ingredients

Bread flour has the necessary amount of gluten to hold the air bubbles and provide the pull focaccia needs.

If possible, avoid commercial salt.  Redman’s brand is good, but any minimally processed sea salt will do.

Extra virgin olive oil really does make a difference and it is worth finding.

Ah, I remember when I tasted real focaccia

Near my once home in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn is Ferdinando’s Focacceria, a 100 year Sicilain eatery. It was here that I had for reals focoaccia. I had no idea that I would not find the real deal as easily as I had just by stumbling in to Ferdinando’s.

A proper focaccia can be several things and each will be, according to at least on Siciliano, the real deal. All have an airy crumb, lots of extra virgin olive oil and incredible flavor. That’s the thing lacking in so many breads which claim to be focaccia: they are fake focaccia. They are the off-Broadway stand-in: does a fine job and the show is not less for it, but it ain’t the star.

Ferdinando’s was the best focacciaria

Making focaccia the Ferdinando’s way takes time. Time is what makes the flavor and the irregular holes. I’ve developed my own which includes using a small amount of poolish, a sourdough word meaning starter. Terminology is far less important that getting flavor into the bread. If you keep a sourdough starter at home, use that. If you don’t, no worries. You can make one.

Focaccia dough is not a standard bread dough which fights back when you knead it. Focaccia dough is somewhat formless, a big bread dough amoeba. It will stick to your hands and everything it touches. All bread is, to me, a zen thing, and this is the culmination of all those skills. To work with the dough, you have to move your hands faster than the sticky sticks. It takes practice and a complete understanding that you will wear part of the dough on your hands.

The recipe I am providing is enough to make a ¼ sheetpan. Professional kitchens often measure based on pan size: full sheet or half sheet. These ¼ sheet pans are perfect for home use.  Most cookie sheets (properly Jelly Roll pans) have the approximate volume of a half sheet pan. This recipe easily doubles or quadruples if your needs be.

How do you top a focaccia?

There is almost nothing that can be put on top of a focaccia. Some basic guidelines are thin. The ingredients should be thin.  Any flavor combinations you can think of and that appeal to you can probably go on your focaccia.  Fresh herbs are generally better flavor and look nicer even when baked.

Slabs of focaccia for sale Pans of focaccia baked and ready to eat

 

 

 

 

Side view of Focaccia with marjoram
Nice crumb on the focaccia.
Focaccia with marjoram
Focaccia with marjoram and salt and pepper.

 

 

 

 

 

Here is my YouTube video showing the chef, the dough and how to work with the dough.

 

Here is the video of the focaccia coming out of the oven.

This book was so instrumental to my further development as a baker.  Of course, baking is the real teacher, but Reinhart is excellent.

Click the book to purchase your own copy.

The Bread Bakers Apprentice book

Print

Focaccia

Maybe the easiest, and at the same time, more challenging, breads to make.  The easy part is it's hard to fail.  The challenging part is the sticky dough.  Many cooks and even some bakers care not for dough sticking to their fingers.  Ah, but so it goes.

Course Main Course, Side Dish
Cuisine Italian
Keyword Bread, Focaccia, Herbed bread, Italian bread
Prep Time 1 day
Cook Time 15 minutes
Total Time 1 day 15 minutes
Servings 6 People
Author Dann Reid

Ingredients

Poolish

  • 50 g Bread flour
  • 50 g Water
  • 1 g Sea salt

Focaccia Dough

  • 320 g Bread flour
  • 33 g Poolish
  • 7 g Sea salt
  • 1 g Instant yeast
  • 228 g Water
  • 43 g Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Instructions

Tools

  1. Mixing bowls

    Scale

    Wooden spoon, thick

    Mixer

    Rubber scraper 

    Kitchen scale

Mixing

  1. Add the chef, water and olive oil to the bowl of a stand mixer. Add the flour, salt, and yeast. Mix on low speed for 4 minutes. Turn the mixer to medium speed for another 4 minutes or until the dough comes together and cleans the side of the bowl. There is every reason to expect that this dough will not release from the bottom of the bowl. That is how it is supposed to be. Remember, this is a runny dough.

Folding

  1. Using a rubber spatula or bowl scraper remove the dough to a extra virgin olive oil coated sheet pan. Oil your fingers as well and push the dough to spread out the size of the pan. Fold the dough as a business letter, in thirds. The dough should be as wide as the pan and in the middle. Brush the top of the dough with EVOO. Turn the dough 90 degress and flip it over. Brush the new dough top again with EVOO, cover the pan with plastic wrap and place in a cool place, like a refrigerator, over night. The next day, remove the plastic, brush the dough with oil and using the bowl scraper work to loosen the dough from the pan, flip it over, stretch it to the full size of the pan then fold it again. Cover with the plastic wrap and allow to come to room temperature.

Toppings

  1. Toppings for focaccia are nearly endless. There are some basic guidelines, however, to make the most of your bread. Some toppings ideas are

    Fresh chopped herbs

    Onions and garlic

    Zucchini

    Red onions

    Mushrooms

    Cheeses

    Raisins

    Pepperoni

    Salami

    Olives

    Mushrooms should always be cooked before putting on a focaccia. Onions can remain raw if they are sliced very thin or diced and cooked. Tomatoes should be cut into smaller pieces than whole slices for they have so much water they will make soggy that which we wish to be crunchy.

Baking

  1. I place thinly sliced zucchini which have been lightly salted and coated in EVOO on the top like overlapping coins. I salt and pepper the focaccia first, then the zucchini and thinly sliced red onions then kosher salt. I allow that to proof to the top of the pan and then bake it at 425 degrees for about 15 minutes. The bread should release from the pan, but if not, simply slide a metal spatula or cake decorating spatula between the bread and the pan. With a bit of poking, it should release easily.

    Allow the dough to cool in the pan for a few minutes then remove it to a cooling rack to allow the bottom to keep the yummy crusty bits.

    Zucchini focaccia ready to go in the proofer

You can listen to Peter Reinhart and I discuss his new book, Perfect Pan Pizza, here, Episode 38.

Click this link to buy the proofer I use.

Here’s a link to another focaccia I made, pressed into it by my friend Elvira.

Chocolate Crêpes

Chocolate Crêpe Batter

I’ve enjoyed crêpes dessert and breakfast. This chocolate version is probably more a dessert thing, but you do you. I made them to create the cake at the top of the page. I joke that that the most difficult part was making the half moon crêpes, but of course, I just cut the cake in half and stacked it. We are 4 so no need for a giant cake.

100% Kona Coffee
Enjoy making these and then eating them.

Millies crepe cake
Crepe cakes are all the rage, so say my daughters who both want one as the birthday cake.

 

 

 

 

 

Print

Chocolate Crêpe Batter

Chocolate crêpes are yummy as a cake (this is a big trend these days) or as the casing for a yummy macerated berry dessert or a twist on Crêpes Suzette

Course Dessert, Snack
Cuisine French
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Total Time 45 minutes
Servings 8 people

Ingredients

  • 50 g all purpose flour sifted
  • 21 g cocoa powder sifted
  • 45 g granulated sugar
  • 1/8 t salt
  • 2 eggs
  • 6 oz whole milk
  • ½ t best vanilla extract 1 t if not top notch
  • 1 oz butter browned and cooled

Instructions

  1. Place the flour, cocoa, sugar and salt into a large mixing bowl. Add both eggs and whisk them into the dry ingredients until a stiff paste is formed. You may not incorporate all the dry, but that’s okay and expected. The important task here is getting as much of the dry into a lump as possible. Add the browned butter and a wee bit of milk.
  2. Whisk slowly and deliberately to avoid splashing onto the counter or you. Add a bit more milk and keep whisking and adding until the milk is gone. Transfer the batter to a container and refrigerate at least 30 minutes.
  3. Cocoa is exceptionally dry. Depending on your kitchen and the cocoa, you may need to whisk into the batter a little more milk. Start with a tablespoon and add more milk if needed.

  4. How will you know if it is needed? When you cook your first crêpe you will know. I have not had crepes not work for too much liquid as long as it is reasonable.

  5. Nonstick pans are a wonder which I love to use in the kitchen. Crêpes is as good a reason as any to own one.

  6. For a normal 8 inch pan, about ¼ cup of batter is enough. I use less because I want the thinnest crepe I can make. Too thick, and they lose that quality which makes them crepes. And they are not good pancakes.

  7. Keep your pan on low heat. Speed is not our concern here. Getting the crêpe cooked, browned and released is our concern and it takes the time it takes. Crêpes are zen. They will tell you when they are done.

  8. Start by pouring quickly but not fast the batter into the middle of the heated pan. With a wrist motion, twirl the pan to allow the crepe batter to coat the bottom of the pan. Return the pan to the stove and allow it to cook. You can pry at the edges to start to loosen the edge. As it cooks, the edges will start to curl a bit and that is a sign that you can flip. You’ll see in a video I’ve linked the cook uses a spatula. I use my fingers. It’s not that hot and using our fingers helps prevent tools poking holes in your crêpes.

  9. Flip it over and cook it for a few seconds just to make sure both sides are done. When done, place it on a baking paper lined sheet pan. Repeat the process and place each crepe on the previous but descending a bit, like a stack of quarters which as slid into a line.
  10. When they are cool, they can be stacked and wrapped in a zip top baggy until ready to use.
    stack of cooked crepes

Recipe Notes

Here's the video showing the write motion of crepe batter distribution.

ON-It's Chocolate, Baby!
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