Chef Bane’s Ultimate Focaccia Bread

Baking always gives me a high! But baking at 12,000 ft with Chef Bane put me on a different altitude.

When your family is full of amazing bakers, you devour food. And when you leave your sheltered nest, you find more oft than not when it comes to food you are hard to please because you have usually eaten better. But when I ate this focaccia bread, I knew I had to meet the hands that created this amazing bread.

Incidentally at that time I was reading His Holiness Dalai Lama’s teachings on kindness and compassion. The teachings say the secret to our own happiness, our own good future is within our own hands and that we must not miss that opportunity… neither should you miss learning the secrets to focaccia bread from Chef Bane’s hands, the opportunity which I didn’t want to miss 😀 !!!!

I love the way the bread is perfectly crisp on the outside and soft and airy on the inside. The herbs, peppers and olive oil makes it so flavourful, you can build a meal around it. It is surprisingly quick and easy. If you ever wanted to make a bread .. let this be the one you start with.

Enjoy the high you get from baking ❤️

Ingredients:

1. Refined all purpose flour (flour category A ideally ) – 500 gm

2. Bread improver- 1 gm

3. Salt- 10 gm

4. Yeast- 10 gm

5. Sugar- 20 gm

6. Vegetable oil- 20 ml

7. Water- 275 ml ( divided use )

Method:

1.Mix refined flour, bread improver, salt, yeast, sugar in a mixer with a dough hook.

2. Mix water( 250 ml), if required add the remaining quantity (25 ml).

3. Add 20 ml oil to the dough and mix properly.

4. After it is mixed properly, take the dough out of the mixer and keep it out for 10 minutes, cover with a wet cloth.

5. After keeping it out for 10 minutes, flatten it out using your finger tips and put it onto a 10 inch greased tray and add the desired topping.

Suggested topping :

Sliced onion – 1 small onion

Mixed red and green bell peppers – 1/4 cup ( both together 1/4 cup )

Black Olives sliced – 1/8 cup

Virgin olive oil- 1/4 cup

Oregano – 1 tsp

Salt – 1/2 tsp

Method :

In a bowl mix all the ingredients, ending with the olive oil.

Spoon the topping onto the flattened dough and keep it at room temperature for 20 minutes for proofing.

Preheat the oven to 175 C and bake the bread for 7 mins to 10 mins until bread starts becoming golden. Take out from oven. Cool slightly.

Cut into squares and serve warm.

xoxo❤️,

Sareeka