Focaccia Recipe

every garden leads to the kitchen at least for me fresh or dry oregano is always in my kitchen in the aroma welcomes in my guests ah welcome to my home the smell of fresh-baked bread is the best way I can greet my guests upon their arrival for an extra special touch I serve it with the basil spread a seaside favorite these are always on the menu at my house especially when I travel back to Italy with my grandchildren mamiru T nel mio Jay Leno and Lamia Cucina focaccia doll Tamura compare the cannellini a basilica who doesn't love the smell of baking breads in the house well focaccia is one of those breasts that you can make it's simple its straightforward and it's one of my favorite so in order to make any bread you need it to rise and we're gonna prove some east this is some rice let's just put a little bit of sugar in there and the sugar is the food for the yeast actually so it rises and some warm water and let's give it a good mix so we let that right and we're gonna top our focaccia with some tomatoes and onions the little cherry tomatoes ripe ones are better if they're big you cut them in half but they're small you can even leave them home some onions that always adds a delicious taste some olive oil salt will let this marinate now of course this is simple and sweet and delicious but you could put some oregano in there for whatever you'd like some people don't Gina if you like yourself but I love it this way so here let's make the dough we have the flour put some salt and let's begin so whenever you're making a dough you have of course the flour and the wet ingredients and you do a little bit the wet a little bit at the time and you let it incorporate I just let it gather all together I think it's just about ready because I'm gonna finish it a little bit with hand kneading I like to get my hands in the dough I'm going to finish it off with a little bit of flour just kind of you need it okay and not too much flour because we want a nice soft dough okay I love the sound of dough I remember my grandmother always used to smack our dough so this has to rise so let's still just a little bit of oil in a bowl and make sure that the bowl is drone temperature and just coated lightly with olive oil this way as the dough Rises it doesn't encounter the friction of the glass it kind of glides up it's already beginning to rise just yeah and you cover it with some plastic wrap so the heat stays in there and it will double in size if you get the right rise and I'll take about an hour to get there Altamira is known for some of the best bread in all of Italy and of course it is about the semolina flour and the grain that grows there but it is about this artisan tree of family traditions of baking the bread and making the bread kneading it shaping it a wood-fired oven and to you know the timing of moving around this bread because it is some of the best bread and some of the best focaccia in all of it the gotta have its first rising let me just oil a little bit the sheet pan where we gonna bake it and not too much oil but of course we need to oil the whole base so it doesn't stick and a little bit up the sides that's ready so let's go to the dough mm-hmm that's risen nicely let's punch it down and you start from the sides and you kind of you punch it down just like that put it right in the pan here and you see how soft it gets and this is the way you want the focaccia because the focaccia is gonna get light and crispy this way and you wanted to cover the whole pan I want it to be more or less the same thickness all around and now we put the tomatoes and the onions over it spread it out evenly now you let it be in a nice regular room temperature is fine 20 minutes to half an hour it has to rise again and then we'll make it one of the most fascinating elements of the bread from as the mortar and the focaccia is the crispness the texture of this bread the crust is kind of crackles like glass and the focaccia is kind of oozing and dripping with great taste the focaccia has risen again and it's beautiful ready for the oven coarse salt I like a little coarse salt on my focaccia and of course you can do as you like but a little bit of coarse salt is due in my house and this is ready to go into the oven a hot oven 425 degrees and for about 15-20 minutes we'll begin to get nice and golden shifted around so it gets golden on all sides for another 15 20 minutes and it's done the heel of Italy is known for its great olive groves and for its wine Rose evermore the wine that traditional varietals are the Moscato the narrow Detroit and the Bambino full of body taste they're producing some great wines the focaccia is done we let it rest for about 10-15 minutes as you can see it shrinks a little bit as it cooks but it looks great I like a little bit of dry oregano over it just when it's finished so you know I love this bouquets of oregano and all you do is the bouquet just kind of a little bit like that and you save the rest collect everything and while the focaccia is still warm it will absorb some of the flavors of this oregano now I want to make a spread a pureed which is really wonderful and it's a bean puree with basil and lots of basil so almost like making a pesto first and then bean puree to keep the bright color of the basil I'm gonna blanch the basil put it in boiling water just for a moment okay and we'll begin to make the pesto lots of parsley as well pine nuts and a garlic clove if you like it more garlicky put two pine nuts give it that kind of delicious creamy mess that's good soda basil I think we can pull right out it's nice and green and sort of shock it right in iced water just let it cool and we want to wring it we don't want any of the water because the pureed you want sort of nice and creamy you don't want it watery I am putting it in a clean towel here because I'm gonna bring it nice and dry mmm delicious smell so let's let's ring it and let's put some salt to season this and some peperoncino and again let's sort of get this nice and chopped fine because once you have the beans in there then you don't have an opportunity to chop it as spine so make sure that you get your pesto going first a little bit of olive oil okay scrape everything down here so beans these are cannellini beans nice and dry cooked but you know what you can do this also with canned beans just make sure that you wash them and drain them low I'm looking at it looks good look at maybe more oil and you know a little bit more salt so all I think it needs is a little bit of cheese cheese the grated cheese and if you like it a little bit more zesty air and spicier you can put the pecorino okay collect at all this is dill it's yours oh so let's get the focaccia going and voila so this is the focaccia let me cut it in half [Music] this piece I'm gonna cut like this so everybody gets a little bit of tomatoes you know what maybe I'll cut it in all different sizes that's a long one this is more over squarish so we certainly have a nice serving here you put a little bit of basil just to reinforce the basil element there and I like the crust so I'm going to spread some of thee it's this delicious or what I can just eat it like that or I could put a nice prosciutto cotta on top of it just like that and this is an open sandwich delicious for lunch with a little salad for your friends now let's taste hmm hey delizia you didn't tell it's yourself

Channel: Lidia Bastianich

Views: 112,203

Rating: 4.9188094 out of 5

Keywords: bread, focaccia, recipe, lidia bastianich, lydia, lidia's italy, lidia's kitchen, episode, full episode, tomato, onion

Id: pvp9nXlAUNQ

Length: 11min 37sec (697 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 23 2020