Overnight Focaccia
A wet dough, a cold night in the fridge, and almost no kneading. The oven does the work; you mostly need to be patient in advance.
- Prep
- 20m
- Cook
- 25m
- Waiting
- 15h
- Total
- 15h 45m
- Serves
- one 23x33 cm tray
- Effort
- Moderate
Method
| 500 g | 1 Mix to a shaggy mass and leave 20 minutes 5m | 2 Fold in the bowl 4 times, 15 minutes apart 1h Wet hand, lift one edge, fold over. That is the entire kneading. | 3 Cold-ferment 12–18 hours in the fridge 12h Slow and cold builds flavour and makes the wet dough manageable. | 4 Oil the tray, pour in the dough, and let it relax 15m | 5 Dimple hard with oiled fingers, then prove 45 minutes 50m Push right through to the tray. The dimples are what keep it from turning into bread. | 6 Bake at 230°C / 450°F until deep gold 25m Bottom shelf. You want the base to colour as much as the top. | |
| 400 g | |||||||
| 10 g | |||||||
| 4 g | |||||||
| 4 tbsp | |||||||
| 1 tsp | |||||||
| 2 sprigs | |||||||
- 1
Mix to a shaggy mass and leave 20 minutes
5m- strong white flour 500 g
- water 400 g
- fine salt 10 g
- instant yeast 4 g
- 2
Fold in the bowl 4 times, 15 minutes apart
1h- from 1 Mix to a shaggy mass and leave 20 minutes
Wet hand, lift one edge, fold over. That is the entire kneading.
- 3
Cold-ferment 12–18 hours in the fridge
12h- from 2 Fold in the bowl 4 times, 15 minutes apart
Slow and cold builds flavour and makes the wet dough manageable.
- 4
Oil the tray, pour in the dough, and let it relax
15m- from 3 Cold-ferment 12–18 hours in the fridge
- olive oil 4 tbsp
- 5
Dimple hard with oiled fingers, then prove 45 minutes
50m- from 4 Oil the tray, pour in the dough, and let it relax
Push right through to the tray. The dimples are what keep it from turning into bread.
- 6
Bake at 230°C / 450°F until deep gold
25m- from 5 Dimple hard with oiled fingers, then prove 45 minutes
- flaky salt 1 tsp
- rosemary (optional) 2 sprigs
Bottom shelf. You want the base to colour as much as the top.
Hydration, and why the dough looks wrong
At 80 % hydration this dough is a batter you can barely handle, and that is deliberate. Water is what makes the open, custardy crumb; the price is that you cannot knead it conventionally. Folding solves this. Each fold stretches the gluten sheet and stacks it, so the network develops over an hour of doing almost nothing rather than ten minutes of work.
If the dough tears rather than stretches during the first fold, it simply needs longer. Wait another fifteen minutes and try again.
What the cold night does
Yeast slows dramatically below about 10 °C while the enzymes that break starch into sugar and protein into amino acids carry on. Twelve hours in the fridge therefore builds flavour without over-proving, and the cold dough is stiff enough to pour into a tray without collapsing. Twelve hours is the minimum worth bothering with; eighteen is better; past twenty-four it starts to taste sour.
Notes
- Oil the tray properly. Focaccia is shallow-fried on its underside and that is the best part of it.
- Dimple with real force, right down to the metal. Timid dimples puff back and you get a flat loaf instead.
- Eat it the day it is baked. Day-two focaccia is a sandwich; day-three focaccia is croutons.