Paulchens FoodBlog?!

This month Zorra of Kochtopf – the founder of the yet famous BreadBakingDay announced it’s 2 year anniversary to be celebrated with pizza.

Happy Anniversary Zorra and BBD! We hope for many many more!

Zora told us in her instructions: “Thick or thin Pizza, Focaccia, Lahmacun and other flat breads are allowed as long they come with a topping.”

First I thought: Ok, so I will make my herbed pizza dough again, which my family loved so much when they visited.
Then, while flipping through my newest possession – Peter Reinhart’s Bread Baking Apprentice, I found a recipe for focaccia. I was intrigued. So I read the recipe and instruction over once again. I loved the idea of various toppings and all my former attempts on baking this bread were, let’s put it mildly, not satisfying….

So the idea became more and more vivid: Focaccia was the choice!

The lovely Bread Baking Babes taught me: Nothing can stop you from trying and stepping out of your very own comfort zone can lead to to maximum YUM!

My adaptions to Reinhart’s recipe:
22.5 ounces white spelt flour
0.5 ounce sea salt
0.22 ounce instant yeast
3 ounces olive oil
16 ounces water
1/4 to 1/2 cup herb oil*

other than that I followed the instructions given (mostly).

So this is it. I made a smaller one right the day I prepared the dough, skipping Reinhart’s suggestion to put it in the fridge over night and bake the second day.

The Second one went into the fridge like the instructions said. I added some sundried tomatos to the second one too whereas the first one only has the herbs and the mozzarella as topping.

* Herb Oil
I warmed olive oil to a little more than handwarm and added roughly chopped thyme, rosemary, sage, basil, garlic, sea salt, tarragon.

They both were very good and I was very very pleased with the taste and the whole mouth feeling. We had them for lunch at work and both my test eaters were very pleased too. Can you imagine not a crumb was left? We had the focaccia with warm smoked salmon no other additions tho.

I like the first one (without resting in the fridge) better than the other one.
The dough rised more and was way more fluffy – to me.
The other one was good too – but yet not so fluffy, more dense regarding the crumb and it did rise only half as much as the first one.

Do I need to mention, that all of the Focaccia is gone by now although I put some of it into the freezer?
Popped into the oven for 5 minutes it makes a perfect comfort foodish dinner when you come home from work all crabby and cranky :)

P.S. if you are looking for another great pizza recipe: Try this one, I loved it!!