Focaccia - the holier the better!

For some reason when the sun comes out all I want to do is drink wine and eat bread outside which is exactly what I’ve been doing for the past few days. I’m a huge bread fan but I’m not really into breads stuffed with ‘wacky’ things, instead I prefer plain breads with different textures or rustic sourdoughs that hurt your teath when you bite into them. These are the breads that are often considered harder to make but I think they’re the ones which you can play around with more and are actually way more impressive than your normal dough recipe with some nuts thrown in!

I’m hoping you’re all going to try this and realise how easy it is to make great bread. There’s a few pointers to making great focaccia:

- It is messy, whoever said good bread shouldn’t stick to your hands was lying.
- The timings at home are not exact, each bread will rise diferently on any given day. As a general rule - longer proving is better. As soon as you get general timings down then you can be as flexible as you like
- More water means a holier bread
- It will rise, don’t worry

Ingredients:

14g Dried Yeast (2 sachets)

500g Strong White Flour

Olive Oil

Maldon Salt

Water

Method:

- Put 100g of the flour into a bowl with 100 ml water and the yeast
- Mix together to form a batter and leave for 20 minutes (this is called a sponge)
- Add the rest of the flour along with the olive oil and 10g salt diluted in water
- Keep adding water and mixing the dough until it resembles a cake mixture, at this point if you’re brave you can keep adding water, as long as it still holds you’ll end up with a lovely hole filled crunchy bread.
- Tip your mixture out onto the surface and kneed by continually scraping the mixture off the table and kneeding.
- After 10 minutes of kneedin the mixture will be smoother and glossy
- Scrape the mixture off the table and into an oil covered square bowl
- Cover the bowl with clingfilm and leave for an hour (ish)
- Transfer onto an oil covered baking sheet and push your finger tips into the mixture all over (This creates the holey surface and knocks the mixture back)
- Leave for a final 30 minutes to prove and put your oven on to heat up to 220 degrees
- Drizzle with more olive oil and salt before putting in the oven
- Bake for around 30 minutes or until golden and risen


Enjoy!

Everybody loves pizza!

The other week photographer Jesse Seaward and myself took to the studio to take some food shots and below are the results!

I love pizza! Who doesn’t love pizza? And what more would you want to accompany them than a massive pot of mayonnaise? [My mouth's watering as I write!] Once you start making your own you’ll realise just how rubbish supermarket pizzas are and even some great takeaway pizza places will start to seem dull in comparison with the crisp-based beauties that’ll be coming out of your oven.

I started making pizzas because I enjoyed making bread, simple. However pizza dough is so simple that anyone can do it, even on a work night. Simply throw it all together and then leave it until you start getting hungry, they only take about 10 minutes so arrive home, chuck ingredients together, shower, change, have a beer and then the dough will be ready! Easy.

In answer to the 2 questions everybody asks when making homemade pizzas:

1.     Can you actually make great pizas in a normal home oven? – Yes you can, a proper pizza oven is way hotter than a normal home oven but you can get truly outstanding results from any domestic oven.

2.     Does a pizza stone make any difference? – Yes it does, the bottom will be crispier and less chance of a soggy base. If you want to spend extra money then get one but it’s not essential.

(For the tomato sauce I simply get a good can of chopped tomatoes, put it in a pan with loads of salt and pepper and simmer for around 30 mins until reduced and thick)

Ingredients (Makes 3 pizzas):

Pizza Dough –

14g dried yeast

250g strong bread flour

250g ‘00’ flour

10g salt

1 tbsp honey

1 tbsp olive oil

water

Topping –

1 can chopped tomatoes (reduced until thick)

2 Mozzarella balls

200g good sun dried tomatoes or oven dried tomatoes

1 pack of basil

Olive oil

Method:

-       Put the yeast with 100ml water and 100g bread flour and whisk until it becomes a smooth thick paste

-       Leave this mixture for 15 minutes until it begins to bubble (this is to get  the yeast started a bit, it’s called a sponge)

-       Add the rest of the flours, olive oil, salt and water and mix in a bowl until the mixture comes together to a soft and slightly sticky ball

-       Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and kneed for 10 minutes until the dough is smooth and the dough pushs back when you poke your finger in.

-       Leave the dough for around an hour or until the mixture has doubled in size (you can leave it for longer so the best thing to do is forget about it and then make the pizzas when you’re hungry!)

-       Preheat your oven as hot as it will go, 250 degrees with most ovens

-       Spread a small amount of tomato sauce onto the base, rip up some mozzarella and place on the pizza along with the tomatoes

-       Put in the oven for 10-15 minutes depending on how good your oven is

-       Garnish with ripped basil and a splash of olive oil

Who needs a take away pizza when you’ve got these?!