Simple and detailed recipe for the perfect sourdough focaccia. Although it's geeky, everyone can follow this recipe, where we have a video that describes the entire process.
Recipe for foccacia (sourdough)
Simple and detailed recipe for the perfect sourdough focaccia. Although it’s a bit technical, everyone can follow along with this recipe, where we have a video that describes the entire process.
Here we use this liquid wheat sourdough recipe (which is also easy to make) as the base for the recipe.
Focaccia is somewhat a hybrid between bread and cake, but it fits best as a side to dinner, an appetizer, or as a snack with a good glass of wine.
In my work with GastroFun PREMIUM, I am fortunate to meet talented food profiles, and here I have been taught by Kim Rosengreen, who among other things, teaches sourdough courses, is a trained baker, and has taken a Masterclass in Sourdough. This is Kim’s favorite sourdough recipe, and we are lucky that he wanted to share it with us.
Servings: bread
Foccacia (sourdough)
Simple and detailed recipe for the perfect sourdough focaccia. Although it's geeky, everyone can follow this recipe, where we have a video that describes the entire process.
Equipment
- Baking Steel
Ingredients
- 600 gram Sourdough refreshed
- 500 gram Wheat Flour
- 340 gram Water
- 2 gram Yeast
- 15 gram Salt fine
- 75 gram Water extra
Topping
- 229 gram Olive Oil about 2 dl
- 6-10 cloves Garlic finely chopped/crushed
- 1 handful Fresh rosemary
- Flake Salt
Instructions
- Add sourdough starter, water (only the 340 grams), flour, and yeast to a bowl.
- Mix it on your stand mixer at low speed (1 out of on my Ankarsrum) for 6 minutes.
- Now it needs to be kneaded "quickly," which means about 2.5 if your mixer’s scale goes from 1 to 5, or generally just think half the speed your mixer can go.
- Knead the dough for 3 minutes and add the salt. It should now run for another 4-5 minutes. Pour a bit of the extra water in over 3-4 times during that period.
- To make sure the dough has been kneaded enough, you can do a gluten test. You do this by wetting your hands (they should not be dripping wet) and taking a piece of the dough. Lift it up and try to spread it out. If you can do that and you can almost see through it, then it is as it should be.
- Now the dough needs to go from the mixing bowl into a form. It's important that the form is of a good size so you can get down and tighten it up continuously. Here, a form from Ikea, typically used in a children's room, is used. But if it's approved for children to play with it, we also think it can be used for a cold dough. Grease the form with a thin layer of neutral oil or spray fat/oil if you have it.
- Pour the dough into the form and use a spatula to help you get it all out.
- Now let it rise at room temperature for 1 hour. The temperature should preferably be between 20-25 degrees Celsius (68-77 degrees Fahrenheit).
- While it’s rising, you can make the garlic/rosemary oil:
- Put the olive oil in a bowl. Remove the rosemary from its stalks and chop it coarsely. Crush/finely chop the garlic and put everything in the bowl with the olive oil so it can steep and absorb the flavors.
- After an hour of rising, the bread needs to be folded. Wet/moisten your hands, grab one end, and fold it over to the other end. Repeat all the way around, moistening your hands between each fold.
- Let it rise for another hour.
- Repeat the folding process and let it rise for another hour.
- Find a high baking tray and line it with baking paper. The recipe fits a 30x40 cm baking form, which is standard in most ovens.
- Make another folding round with moist hands.
- Lift the dough onto the baking paper, and now it needs to go into the form. Do this by putting some of your oil on your fingers and pressing them hard through the dough while trying to push it out towards the edges. If you feel the dough is resisting too much and you can’t get it all the way to the edges, stop and let it rest for 5-10 minutes. Then the dough can relax and be pressed all the way to the edges. Moisten your fingers in the oil and press down, preferably all the way to the baking tray (you are not making holes), so it will spread to the edges.
- Let it rise for another 60 minutes; it can rise for another 30-60 minutes if you have the time.
- Put oil on your fingers and press down into the dough all over to create plenty of holes to absorb the oil.
- Distribute the oil with the rosemary and garlic in an even layer over the entire bread.
- Put it in the oven at 275 degrees Celsius (527 degrees Fahrenheit) conventional oven (use convection/fan if you have two trays of focaccia in the oven). We baked it with a baking steel at the bottom of the oven; it’s not baked on the steel but about 1 cm above it.
- Bake it for about 15-20 minutes.
- Take it out of the oven and tap on the top if necessary. It should sound like an empty moving box when it’s baked as it should. If you’re not sure if it’s cooked, you can use a meat thermometer to measure the core temperature in the center. If it’s 94 degrees Celsius (201 degrees Fahrenheit), then it's fully baked (this applies to all wheat breads).
- Sprinkle flaky salt on top of the bread, and it is now ready to serve.
- Enjoy your meal.