Recipe: Flower Focaccia
They are all over Pinterest and Instagram Reels the pretty Flower Focaccia. As soon as I saw it I knew I wanna try to make them and what isn’t a better occasion than for a gender reveal party that I was planning right at that time (check out the YouTube video here). The recipe for the original focaccia I got here. I know this is only in Italian and since the English version is slightly different and I did some modifications as well I decided to share my version in this following blog-post.
The main difference between the Italian and English version is that there are more folding rounds and rest time and I think that is crucial for the dough to become that fluffy.
What you need (4 portions):
500g Flour
320g Water
8g Fresh Yeast
25g Italian Olive Oil (extravergine)
10g Salt
Topping:
30g Olive Oil (extravergine)
Coarse Salt
Bell Peppers
Italian Parsley (Whole)
Red Onions
Cherry Tomatoes
Black Olives
How to make the Focaccia
Let’s start with the basic dough: pour the flour into a bowl and add some crumbled fresh yeast. I usually take some luke warm water and let melt the yeast in there before mixing it with the flour. Just make sure to remove that quantity of water from the total amount of water that you will need and listed in the ingredients. Adding this step we make sure that the yeast is evenly distributed into the flour.
Add the water little by little and begin to mix it with your fingers, so that the flour and absorb the water evenly.
Once you mixed in all the water you and take the dough and transfer it to a counter where we need to knead the dough well while pulling it away from you and and back again with the palm of your hands. Make sure to rotate the dough by 90° each time before pulling it again.
Once it starts to become smooth we can start adding the oil little by little while always continuing the rotation of 90° while kneading the dough.
Once we’ve added all the oil we are going to do the same thing while adding the salt little by little. We will continue kneading the dough until it becomes very smooth.
At this point we are going to leave the dough at the counter, cover it with a bowl and let it rest for 15 minutes.
After the resting time we are going to use the “slap & fold” technique: lift the dough with both hands fold it once and beat it on the surface, turn it by 180° And repeat the process for at least 3 times. Then cover it again with a bowl and let it rest for other 15 minutes.
Repeat the process for other 2 times letting the dough always rest for 15 minutes.
Once we’re finished with the “slap & fold” round we can grease the bowl with some olive oil and transfer the dough into the bowl, cover it with a towel and let it rest at warm room temperature for about 3 hours… the dough should tripple in size.
After 3 hours, spread some olive oil on a baking tray and spread the dough with your hands by gently spreading it towards the edges. If the dough keeps sliding back, cover the tray with a towel for 5 minutes and then try again. It will be much easier to spread the dough now.
Wrap the baking tray with a plastic wrap and let it rest for 1 hour.
After the rest time is over pour the 30g olive oil and now is the time to dip our fingers into the dough in order to form the holes that are so typical for the focaccia.
Pur the coarse salt on the surface and start with your creative process by forming flowers and plants with the vegetables that you have. You can get inspired from the pictures that I shared below.
Let the focaccia cook in a very well preheated static oven at 200° for about 30 minutes on the lowest shelf.
Serve best while still hot and fresh
