How To Make Focaccia Bread ~ A Great Homeschool Lesson

Homeschool Life Skills Making Focaccia Bread When we had our Home-made Pizza day, we also did Focaccia Bread while we were waiting for the balls to rise the 2 hours. It was a food-prep day that day, where we encourage our kids to learn some life skills of cooking. I watched this video from Jamie and Gennaro on How To Make Focaccia with #myfoodmemories and it was great and really helped me step by step of really 'how to do it'. Check it out! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUnzfK6fINI Making this dough was so enjoyable and following along with these awesome chefs made it really easy for me to get a great dough. It was so smooth and we had a fun big air bubble that you can so obviously see here in this picture of it after rising before we baked it. The next time we bake this, we will try rosemary and shallots, but as you can hear in this video, Gennaro goes on and on about how many different ingredients you can you use. Basically, you can use most of your leftovers if you have them. This was a great homeschool science lesson for the kids 'playing in the kitchen' with the mixing, stirring, kneading, patience with waiting for it to rise and my children loved it! What a fun way to teach such good habits and lessons for life.

Awesome Focaccia Bread Recipe

600g bread Flour - or All Purpose Flour, here in Canada
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
300ml warm water
3 tsp sugar (optional)
2 1/4 tsp dried active yeast

Directions

Measure out the warm water, add the sugar and the yeast and let it proof, or bubble up.Place the strong bread flour (all purpose), Salt and Olive oil in a bowl, and add the warm water with the yeast.Mix the flour until you cannot mix it with the spoon any longer, and it has become a nice dough. Drop the dough out onto a floured surface and knead the dough to stretch the gluten, and build up the rubber band texture. You want the air inside the dough so it is light and sponge-like about 10 minutes. If it is sticky, add a bit more flour and keep kneading. *Note, watch Jamie do this in the video for the method.Drop the dough out onto a floured surface and knead the dough to stretch the gluten, and build up the rubber band texture. You want the air inside the dough so it is light and sponge-like. Knead for about 10 minutes.Let it proof for 40 minutes, under the bowl on the table, or in a bowl covered.Toss polenta or bread crumbs on the pan.Take the dough out of the bowl, and mold gently with your hands to make the shape of a square. you could roll it, but it's so soft you do not need to roll it out. place in the prepared pan and poke holes in with your fingers, and drizzle olive oil over top. place your toppings in the holes, and load it up with your yummy goodness and drizzle with more olive oil.Let rise, covered with a damp kitchen towel, for 45 minutes until doubled in size. When it has doubled in size, you can sprinkle a little bit of salt now if desired.Then, bake in the oven at 400 F for 20 minutes.When it comes out of the oven, drizzle with olive oil to moisten the bread. Take out of the pan, and slice up to enjoy! This works so good as an addition to any meal, or a snack, and I really like to slice it in half and make a sandwich. :) Olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and crushed garlic are also our favorite ways to serve this delicious bread for dipping.I hope you give this one a try, you will be very impressed. Check out my picks below from amazon.ca to help you with this recipe and other awesome ones from my favorite Chef Jamie Oliver!