Red Onion, Garlic and Rosemary Focaccia

Submitted by Boo L

"A flat-oven baked bread originating in Italy. Don't be afraid by the amount of topping suggested - a whole red onion will be so much that you can't see the surface of the bread anymore; but it all shrivels up when cooked, and using less will make it quite bland. Dill and sage also both work quite well with this recipe. Although this makes '1 loaf' because I only have 12 x 8 baking trays I tend to split this into two loaves and bake them separately, or else it gets squashed. Also beware of adding extra liquid - this tends to suck liquid away and then surprise you when you start kneading, so make sure you've properly mixed before you add anymore"

 

• Ready In: 2hrs 10mins
• Ingredients: 11
• Yields: 1 loaf

ingredients

• 350 g strong white flour
• 1⁄4 teaspoon salt
• 1⁄4 teaspoon sugar
• 7 ml dried yeast
• 2 tablespoons olive oil (30ml)
• 225 ml warm water
• 1 red onion, thinly sliced into half moons
• 1 1⁄2 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 teaspoons garlic, chopped
• 2 teaspoons dried rosemary
• 1 tablespoon coarse salt

directions

1. Sift the flour, salt and sugar into a bowl.
2. Stir in the yeast, (this should be 1 dessert spoon but Zaar doesn't like it -- so it's about half a tbsp) oil and water.
3. Mix to a dough. Add more liquid if kneaded (depends on the dough you're using) but be careful.
4. Turn the dough out and knead it for 10 minutes on a lightly floured surface.
5. Place in an oiled bowl in a warm place (window sill / airing cupboard) for about an hour to double in bulk. Cover it with cling film or a wet tea towel to stop it from forming a crust. (If it does, then knead it some more to get rid of it - but it will then need more proving time to get the air back).
6. Roll the dough out into a rough oval shape about 1cm thick, and place onto an oiled baking tray.
7. Make deep holes in the dough about 1 inch apart.
8. Allow to rise for 20-30 minutes.
9. Preheat the oven to 200C / 400F / GM6
10. Mix together the remaining oil, garlic and rosemary (leave to sit for a little while to flavour the oil).
11. Spread over the surface of the bread, and cover with the chopped onion.
12. Sprinkle over the salt, and then flick on some cold water to stop a skin from warming as it cooks.
13. Bake for 25 minutes, and then cool on a wire rack.

Reviews

[Karen Elizabeth]

I made this in my ABM, which normally gives me excellent results, but in this case, my dough wasn't what I expected when it was ready. So I added a little water, a little flour, and continued to knead manually until I had a dough that looked good. I left this to rise, then punched it down and shaped it by hand to fit my baking tray, and left it to rise again. if I had rolled it by hand I would have had a smoother bread, but we enjoyed this rough focaccia which had marvellous flavour, I love the red onion, garlic and fresh rosemary together! Very good Boo, I'll definitely be making this again. Made for PAC Fall 2009.