In the Year of Fearless Baking: Episode #2: Focaccia

With last week’s successful experience with baguettes still fresh in my mind, I decided to stick with bread for at least the next few weeks of my Fearless Baking project. I think at this point yeast no longer feels like A Big Deal, and even fancy artisan bread seems like something I could make a more regular part of my life, but I also know that the only way to solidify these feelings is through repetition.

Focaccia was definitely next on my list. The bread’s signature flavor combination of rosemary, olive oil and flake salt is up there on my list of favorites (as an aside, when chocolate and/or hazelnuts are added to that mix, it gets pretty damn close to the top). And this great recipe from the Kitchn seemed wonderfully not intimidating. Honestly, where would we be without these fabulous web resources?

My experience making this bread was great. The dough was very soft and sexy, and shaping it was mostly a combination of stretching and squishing.

All in all, the result was pretty tasty. I prefer focaccia to be thicker and a little more sturdy, so next time I make this I will make it a smaller, taller loaf. The flavor was nice, but certainly not complex. Intellectually, I know that complexity requires prolonged rises, but I haven’t yet attained the comfort with bread baking to know exactly what that means (or, more importantly, figured out how to plan ahead enough to allow for two day baking projects). I’ll get there- that’s the point.

In any case, we had fresh focaccia with our beet soup, and it’s hard to argue with that. Something about winter makes bread just that much more wonderful- and the yeasty warmth that fills the house is no small part of that glory. And besides that, soup and bread, with a glass of wine, just tastes better when the wind is howling outside. Just one girl’s opinion.