Easy Roasted-Garlic Focaccia Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What is the best flour for focaccia bread? ›

Focaccia made with high-protein bread flour produces the best results, but all-purpose flour will work as well.

Venetian focaccia is sweet, baked for Easter and resembles the traditional Christmas cake panettone. Sugar and butter are used instead of olive oil and salt. Focaccia barese, which is common in Puglia in southern Italy, is made with durum wheat flour and topped with salt, rosemary, tomatoes or olives.

Add roasted garlic and rosemary: Before the final dimpling dot the top of the dough with roasted garlic cloves and rosemary. Season it with another drizzle of olive oil and flaky sea salt. Bake the focaccia: It only takes about 20-30 minutes for focaccia to cook.

Bake for 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 425°F (220°C), and bake until deep golden brown and an instant-read thermometer inserted in center registers 205°F (96°C), about 10 minutes more. Let cool on pan for 10 minutes. Remove from pan.

Why is my focaccia not fluffy or chewy? It could be the type of flour you used. The best flour to use to make focaccia bread is bread flour which gives you fluffy baked bread. Or, it could also be because you did not knead the dough enough for the gluten to form a structure which can result in flat or dense bread.

What is focaccia bread made of? It's made of the same ingredients any bread is made of. Flour, water, yeast, salt, and a little olive oil for softness. But instead of rising it in a loaf pan, you flatten it with your hands and let it rise.

Thick or thin? The thickness of a focaccia can vary, too, but an authentic focaccia genovese should be rather thin, even if it needn't be quite as thin as my version presented here. So many non-Italian renditions of “focaccia” are more like bread in their thickness.

Woody herbs like Thyme, Rosemary, fresh oregano and Sage are PERFECT for focaccia toppings. They are super fragrant and most importantly pretty ROBUST so the oil will take on the flavour really well.

Different surfaces affect focaccia texture in different ways. Baking sheets give a thinly crunchy bottom. Cast-iron pans (put in the oven) give more of a nuanced crunch.

As Elizabeth Yetter wrote in her helpful primer "How To Punch Down Bread Dough," the more air pockets "you can remove from the dough, the finer the grain (or crumb) will be." While that's great for sandwich bread or sweet rolls, it's not as desirable for loaves, like focaccia, where you want airiness.

Should focaccia dough be very sticky? ›

That's okay, it should be wet and sticky! All bread flour absorbs different amounts of water due to varying protein content. Bread flour with 12-15% protein (ie 12-15g of protein per 100g of flour) is best for focaccia.

The longer you allow the dough to rise, the more air and spongey the bread will be. Overnight Dough: Proofing the dough for 9-14 hours overnight in the fridge is my preferred method, because of the slower fermentation. This process yields a better focaccia texture and taste.

Ingredients: Almost all focaccia varieties use flour, water, salt, oil, and yeast. Two rising periods: In the first period, the dough is mixed together, then set to rest and rise (also called bulk fermentation). In the latter period, the dough is deflated, then transferred to a pan for a second rise.

If you forget to dimple your dough and bake it, the dough will collapse when the bubbles burst, resulting in sad focaccia and a sad baker. To dimple your dough, oil your fingers or the end of a wooden spoon handle and gently poke the dough.

Grano duro is slightly yellow, more granular, and more commonly used for pasta and some breads in the south of Italy. It's also knows as durum wheat flour. Grano tenero is generally what we think of as white flour, and is more broadly used in bread, pizza, and pastry, and northern pasta doughs.

Farina 1 or 2

Even coarser than the previous types, these soft wheat flours are best used for bread and pizza.

Bread flour has a higher protein content than all-purpose flour, ranging from 12% to 14%. That makes this type of flour ideal for all kinds of bread recipes, including hearty sourdoughs, tender brioche, and lacy English muffins.

All-purpose flour produces tender baked goods (as opposed to chewy ones) and is ideal for cakes, muffins, biscuits, piecrust, etc. Bread flour, on the other hand, is ideal for bread, pizza dough, pretzels, etc. – items where a strong crumb and a chewy texture are coveted.