Foccacia Bread

As many of you know, I have been experimenting with baking breads. I have been nearly successful in many of the cases, however, this time around I went with Foccacia bread. Why foccacia? Because the ingredients can be as diverse as you want, once you get the dough made. The process of making the dough is also extremely easy. The total process time of making the dough, to getting it out of the oven was literally only one hour and thirty minutes.

Ingredients:

• Nearly 3 cups of all purpose flour; 2 3/4 for dough, 1/4 cup for removal and kneading
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp of white sugar
• 1 package of active dry yeast
• 1 1/2 tsp of garlic powder
• 1 tsp of oregano
• 1 tsp of dried basil
• 1 tsp thyme
• Fresh ground pepper
• 2 TB of olive oil
• 1 cup of luke warm water
• 1 TB of vegetable or canola oil
• 3 TB of parmesan cheese
• 1 cup shredded mozzarella

Other topics can include olives, tomatoes, jalapeños, or however you like your foccacia bread.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, salt, sugar, yeast, garlic powder, thyme, basil, oregano, and black pepper. To this add the vegetable oil and your water. Mix this together so the dough starts to combine and pull from the edges of the bowl. Put a bit of flour on a dough board, and with floured hands, knead the dough. Add some olive oil to another bowl and place the dough ball in the bowl, tossing to coat the ball with oil. Cover this bowl with a warm towel, and let it rest for 30-45 minutes. The dough should rise abit.

Now, preheat your oven to 425 degrees. In the meantime, grease a baking pan, or as I did, a deep pie pan. Add the dough and shape it a bit, pressing down to a bit with your fingers, then with a fork, prick the entire top. Now, top with your cheeses and bake in the oven for nearly 20-30 minutes (depending on your oven). The bread should be a light golden brown.

I served this with roasted turkey yesterday. Everyone loved it. I will definitely be making this again and again. Enjoy.