---

As I mentioned previously, one of my interests or hobbies is cooking. That’s why one of the categories of my blog will be my recipes but don’t get me wrong, this won’t be a cooking blog, for sure.  

I’ll be posting recipes every now and then, but just for fun, and I’ll try to make it a very interesting but with information of the recipe itself and enough info that can help you to try it yourself. 

 Due to the fact that my family background is Italian, most recipes will be related to Italian cuisine or my own recipes. Because I have always been attracted to my roots. 

What’s a Focaccia and where it is from

---

---

---

---

A focaccia is basically a flat Italian bread. In fact, if you put focaccia in a translator from Italian to English, the result will be flatbread, but focaccia sounds way better. Doesn’t it?.

The focaccia is one of the classic Italian and pretty versatile recipe. You can put whatever you want in it, you can make it sweet or salty, it’s up to you. 

It is often topped with olive oil and herbs or sliced olives traditionally, but there are many different ways of making it. In my case, I only know how to make the simplest one.  In fact, I learned how to make it just last week. 

I’ve done many pizzas before so I knew the basics of how to make a focaccia, the dough is similar but not the same.

There is no exact data of where exactly was the Focaccia first made. Flatbread has been popular throughout the world, so it is believed that the origin was somewhere around Turkey, Italy, Greece, France and Spain.

The name focaccia comes from the Roman words “panis focacius” which means fireplace bread that we could now translate to baked bread. Right?

---

---

Ingredients

---

---

Now let’s go to business, let’s talk about the ingredients. 

There are two ways to do this. With the exact measurement of the recipes or my way, which I prefer, because is more instinctive. 

I’ll give you both and you can pick which one you want to do.

DISCLAIMER: This is a 4hrs recipe, you need 3 hrs to leave the dough rest, so it is a very simple recipe but it takes a very long time to do it.

This is for 3-5 people depending on how big you cut each serve.

---

Exact measurement 1_0,5 k of flour 2_2,5 gr of yeast 3_25 ml of oil(I use olive) 4_350 ml of water 5_15 gr of salt

My way 1_250 gr = One cup in all my recipes, a regular mug(pic below) 2_2 cups of flour 3_1 packet of Quick-rise instant yeast(8 gr) you might need two you’ll see why later. 4_A splash of oil- I usually do a volcano with the flour and I put oil in the hole until the oil spread a bit outside the “Volcano” 5_1 ½ cups of water 6_A palm of salt (picture below)

---

In the picture are 2 cups and a 341 ml can so you can see the sizes, doesn’t matter which one you pick, just stay with one size, you have to be consistent :).

---

This is a palm of salt

---

Instructions

---

---

1_ You have to put half of the flour and the whole yeast in a bowl. Then mix it with a spoon or if you have a mixing machine it’s better, I don’t have one, so I do everything by hand or with a wooden spoon. If I can, you can do it too 😅. This is to oxygenate the flour and yeast. 

---

---

---

2_ Add half of the water, little by little while you mix it.

---

3_ Add the salt, the rest of the flour and oil and mix it.

---

4_  Put the rest of the water little by little. if you see that the dough is too liquid you can add a bit more flour. The dough has to be sticky.

---

---

---

---

5_ When you have a homogeneous dough put it in a tupperware, put some flour so it doesn’t stick that much. You can “wash” your hand in flour so you can manage the dough easily. Toss some oil in it. Close the tupperware and let it rest for 3hrs.

---

---

Tupperware with flour

---

---

I put too much oil in it but everything went great (put half of what you see in the pic 😅)

---

6_  After the 3hrs pass take the dough and put it on a baking sheet covered with oil, so the dough doesn’t stick nor burn.

---

7_ With the tip of your fingers push the dough to cover the whole baking sheet.

---

8_ Put some drops of water on the dough and spread it. Then leave it to rest for 30 minutes before putting the focaccia on the oven.

---

---

---

9_ While resting for 30 mins turn on the oven to 200ºC or 392ºF (400 will do).

---

10_ Put the Focaccia on the oven for 15 mins, it may take more or fewer minutes depending on your oven so when your timer said that 12 mins had passed, you can stick a toothpick on the dough. 

---

When you take the toothpick it out and if comes out a bit wet.  It means that the dough needs some more baking. if is dry it means that it is ready, but you’ll know when it’s ready because it changes colours to a brownish or “golden” colour, like a toast.

---

---

---

---

11_ When you take it out of the oven if it thick enough you can do a transversal cut and put whatever you want inside and then put it back 5 more minutes in the oven. 

---

11b_ If like me, it didn’t grow too much you can cut the Focaccia in pairs and make individual “sandwiches”, which are awesome.

---

---

---

---

I invited two friends, so we had one piece of fogaccia each and believe me, they were enough and we really enjoy it.

The day that I made the focaccia, my friend cooked some halal ground beef with some other ingredients and we put some cheese on top to stuff the focaccia. 

We put them in the oven for 5 minutes so the cheese melted and then we ate them. 

At first, I thought that the food wouldn’t be enough with only one piece of focaccia each, but believe me, the 3 of us having a huge appetite, we couldn’t finish the whole thing. 

I honestly hope you that like today’s blog and I hope you try this recipe. It is quite easy to do it but it takes time. A friend of mine told me that the way that looks the focaccia looks like it could be a great thing to put nutella in, or maybe “Dulce de Leche”(milk caramel), so the next time I do this recipe I might try a sweeter version 🙂

Best regards and I hope you have a wonderful weekend, write you next time 🙂