Easy Homemade Focaccia Bread with Tomato, Italian Herbs & Parmesan: A Must-Try Recipe!
There’s nothing quite like the aroma of freshly baked bread filling your home, and this **homemade focaccia** is no exception. With its delightful combination of sweet sun-ripened tomatoes, fragrant Italian herbs, and savory Parmesan cheese, this focaccia recipe is designed to be a showstopper. It’s perfectly versatile, serving as an ideal side dish for your next backyard barbecue, a sophisticated addition to a buffet spread, or a delicious bite for a cocktail party. The bread itself boasts an incredibly airy interior, contrasted beautifully with a wonderfully crispy crust, all crowned with its irresistible topping. Every bite offers a harmony of textures and flavors – the chewiness of the bread, the burst of sweet tomato, the sharp tang of Parmesan, and the aromatic depth of herbs. Truly, this is a culinary experience you won’t want to miss!
Focaccia, a traditional Italian flatbread, holds a special place in the hearts of bread lovers worldwide. Often compared to pizza, it offers a distinct charm. While a pizza is essentially a delicious topping with a thin base of bread, focaccia shines as a substantial loaf of bread adorned with a lighter, yet equally flavorful, topping. It’s a testament to simple ingredients coming together to create something extraordinary.
Originating from Liguria, Italy, focaccia has been a staple for centuries, evolving from a simple hearth-baked bread to the myriad of delicious variations we enjoy today. Its name is derived from the Latin “panis focacius,” meaning “hearth bread,” highlighting its ancient roots in being baked directly on the embers of a fire. This rich history is embedded in every airy bubble and crispy edge of a well-made focaccia.
Making focaccia at home isn’t just about baking; it’s an experience. The process, from kneading the dough to watching it rise, is incredibly satisfying. Plus, when you make it yourself, you control the quality of ingredients, ensuring the freshest, most vibrant flavors. This recipe guides you through creating a focaccia that’s far superior to any store-bought alternative, offering a fresh, wholesome, and customizable option for your table.
Unlocking the Perfect Focaccia Dough: Tips & Tricks
Achieving that signature airy, soft interior and crisp exterior in focaccia requires a few key techniques. Here are some essential tips to help you master your homemade focaccia dough, ensuring a successful and delicious result every time:
- Choosing Your Kneading Method: The dough for focaccia is quite soft and sticky, which can make hand-kneading challenging. For best results and ease, consider using a **bread machine** on its dough program (including the first rise) or a **stand mixer** fitted with dough hooks. If opting for a mixer, ensure the water added is lukewarm (between 85-99°F or 30-37°C), as this temperature range is ideal for activating yeast effectively. Bread machines automate this temperature control, simplifying the process. While hand-kneading is possible, be prepared for a stickier experience and ensure thorough kneading to develop the gluten.
- Yeast Activation is Key: To give your focaccia its characteristic airiness, always add a small spoonful of sugar when activating your yeast. Sugar acts as food for the yeast, helping it to produce carbon dioxide bubbles that give the dough its light and fluffy texture. Observing bubbles on the surface after 5 minutes indicates that your yeast is active and ready to work its magic.
- The Importance of Kneading Time: Don’t skimp on kneading! It’s crucial to knead the dough for at least 10, but preferably 15 minutes. This extended kneading time allows the gluten in the flour to develop properly, which is what gives the bread its desirable soft, elastic, and airy crumb, preventing it from becoming hard or overly chewy.
- Strategic Cheese Addition: Parmesan cheese is a fantastic addition, but its timing is important. Since focaccia bakes at a high temperature, adding Parmesan at the very beginning can cause it to burn and become unpleasantly hard. To achieve a perfectly melted, golden-brown crust, bake the focaccia for the first 10 minutes, then remove it, sprinkle with the Parmesan, and return it to the oven for another 7 minutes or until golden and bubbly.
Make-Ahead & Freezing: Enjoy Focaccia Anytime
One of the fantastic advantages of this focaccia recipe is its flexibility for make-ahead preparation and freezing. This means you can always have a delicious, fresh-tasting bread ready for an impromptu gathering or a weeknight meal. Here’s how to do it:
- To prepare in advance, bake the focaccia with the tomato and herb topping for 15 minutes (omitting the Parmesan cheese for this initial bake). Once cooled, carefully transfer the bread to a freezer bag, ensuring it’s sealed tightly to prevent freezer burn. This method allows you to freeze your tomato focaccia for up to two months, preserving its flavor and texture.
- When you’re ready to serve, there’s no need to thaw the bread beforehand. Simply preheat your oven to 465°F (240°C). Place the frozen focaccia directly into the hot oven and bake for 10 minutes. After this initial reheat, sprinkle generously with Parmesan cheese and bake for an additional 6 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and golden, and the bread is warmed through and crispy. This quick reheating method brings it back to life with a fresh-baked quality.
Serving Suggestions and Creative Variations
This tomato, Italian herb, and Parmesan focaccia is incredibly versatile and pairs well with a variety of dishes and occasions. Here are some ideas to inspire your culinary journey:
- Alongside Your BBQ: Its light texture and savory topping make it a perfect complement to grilled meats, sausages, or even vegetarian skewers. The fresh flavors cut through the richness of grilled foods beautifully.
- Buffet or Cocktail Party Star: Cut into small squares or strips, it transforms into an elegant appetizer. Serve it alongside olives, cured meats, or a vibrant caprese salad for an authentic Italian spread.
- With Soups and Salads: Focaccia is an excellent dipping bread for hearty soups like minestrone, tomato basil, or even a creamy vegetable soup. It also adds a wonderful texture element to any fresh green salad or Caesar salad.
- As a Sandwich Base: Slice it horizontally and fill it with your favorite sandwich ingredients – perhaps some mozzarella, prosciutto, arugula, or grilled vegetables for a truly gourmet experience.
- Creative Topping Variations: Don’t limit yourself to just tomatoes and Parmesan!
- **Olives & Rosemary:** For a classic touch, scatter pitted Kalamata or green olives and fresh rosemary sprigs over the dough before baking.
- **Caramelized Onion & Thyme:** Sweet, savory caramelized onions with fresh thyme create a deeply flavorful focaccia.
- **Fig & Prosciutto:** For a sophisticated sweet and savory option, try thinly sliced figs and crispy prosciutto after baking.
- **Garlic & Chilli Flakes:** A simple yet potent variation, brushed with garlic-infused olive oil and a sprinkle of chilli flakes for a subtle kick.
- **Pesto Swirl:** Swirl some homemade or store-bought pesto into the dough or on top before baking for an extra burst of herbaceous flavor.
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Andréa
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Equipment
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A conventional oven is used. When using a convection oven (with air fan) decrease the temperature with 30 °F / 20 °C
Ingredients
Focaccia
- 500 grams flour
- 2 teaspoons yeast, instant
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 300 ml water, lukewarm
- 30 ml olive oil
Topping
- 2 tomato , roma tomatoes are delicious
- 2 tablespoons Italian herbs , such as thyme, rosemary, oregano
- 1 clove garlic
- 3 tablespoons olive oil, extra vierge
- 30 grams Parmesan cheese
All my recipes are written both in Metric (gram / ml) and US Customary (cups / pounds). Here you can select which type of amount you would like to see.
Instructions
Preparation
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Put the yeast together with the sugar and the water in a small bowl and mix well.
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Let stand for 5 minutes. During this time you get bubbles on the surface. If there are no bubbles, then your yeast is no longer good and it is better to use a new bag/package.
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Place a baking paper on the baking sheet.
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Wash the tomatoes and cut into thin slices (¼ inch, ½ cm thick) and season with salt and pepper.
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Finely chop the Italian herbs and garlic for the topping and mix them with the olive oil.
Focaccia
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Put the flour in the bowl and add the yeast mixture and the olive oil.
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Knead with the mixer for 5 minutes and then sprinkle the salt on it.
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Mix another 10 minutes until the dough is smooth.
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Grease a bowl with some oil and put the dough in it.
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Turn the dough once and first cover the bowl with a slightly damp tea towel over which you put plastic foil.
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Place the bowl in a warm place and let the dough rise for an hour.
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Preheat the oven to 430 degrees Fahrenheit (220 degrees Celsius).
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Press the air out of the dough.
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Place the dough on a baking sheet and press it into the desired shape (about ½ inch / 1.5 cm thick).
Topping
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Push with your fingers holes in the Focaccia (not completely through the dough, just enough until you get a slight bowl).
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Spread the tomato slices on top of the Focaccia.
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Sprinkle the bread with the herbal oil.
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Bake the bread for 10 minutes in the oven, remove it and sprinkle with the Parmesan cheese. Then bake for another 5 to 10 minutes until the Focaccia is golden brown.
Notes
- You can prepare the dough in the bread machine, choose the dough program with the first rise. If you don’t have a bread machine then you can also use a mixer with dough hooks. Just make sure that in that case the water you are going to add is lukewarm. Yeast works best between 85 – 99 degrees Fahrenheit (30 and 37 degrees Celsius). Because you add the water warm the yeast is starting to work right away. In the bread machine this process is automated.
- Making the focaccia kneading by hand is possible, but the dough is rather sticky, so that won’t be easy. Opt for a mixer or bread machine if you got one.
- When using yeast add a small spoonful of sugar. The yeast breaks down the sugar and turns it into air bubbles which gives airiness to the dough.
- Knead the dough at least 10, but even more preferably 15 minutes, to allow the gluten to develop properly. This makes the bread soft and fluffy instead of hard and chewy bread.
- Don’t add the cheese in the beginning. That way it will burn. The bread is baked at a very high temperature and the cheese will become very hard and brown when it is added immediately with the rest of the topping. Therefore bake the focaccia 10 minutes take it out, sprinkle with the cheese and bake for another 7 minutes.
Nutrition
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