Simple Bake Focaccia Bread

Do you love Pizza? many people do.Focaccia happens to be an Italian Pizza Like Bread ,very tasty and one can employ a variety of toppings the only difference between the two types of bread perhaps being the amount of yeast employed and thick crust of the Focaccia Bread.

Focaccia is an easy and simple bake kind of bread and requires less skill in making than a typical pizza bread.It is very tasty and hardly takes time.I find it to be the most simple and perhaps the recommended bread type that a novice should first try their hand at.

In this post i will give a simple recipe of an Olive Oil Focaccia Bread topped with Tomato(Sun Dried preferably) and Rosemary.You can use a variety of other toppings dependent on your liking and taste buds but this simple recipe can work as a guideline.As a cook i will always encourage you to play around with the ingredients and tweak recipes so as to get what can truly be called your unique creation.There's nothing as good as knowing that whatever you have cooked has your authentic signature.It belongs to you and is not a copy cat act.Here goes:

Olive Oil Focaccia Bread Topped With Sun Dried Tomato and Rosemary Herb 

 

 

Ingredients:

1. General Purpose Flour       5 1/3 Cups or 680gms  (Variation 500 gms flour +180gms Semolina Flour)
                                              This is what i used.Makes it crunchy and flavorful.
2. 1 Level Tablespoon Salt     14gms will do.
3. 1 Tablespoon of Sugar        14 gms will do , adjust to your taste(Traditional recipes do not have sugar but                                           this is Africa we love our bread with some taste)
4.  2 cups of  Warm Water  or 400ml
5. 1 Satchet of Angel Instant Dry Yeast  11g(if in Kenya buy the one in a yellow box has better flavour) if not using Angel Instant Dry yeast substitute with 14 gms of any other brand Instant Dry Yeast .
6.  50 ml Olive Oil or 1/4 cup , you can substitute with any other type of  neutral cooking oil though you will suffer loss in flavor and aroma

For Toppings:

Three or Four sprigs of Rosemary Leaves.A can of sun dried tomatoes(due to high price and availability i do with homegrown  medium size or cherry tomatoes, halve them and brush with tomato paste and voila !there you have it rich tomato flavour that will taste equally as good as some of those sun dried tomato brands on your supermarket shelf.Good cooks/Chefs think outside the box).

Method:

Mix the warm water with Olive Oil.

Mix the dry ingredients i.e Flour, Salt, Sugar and Yeast in your mixing bowl, make sure they are well mixed.
Make a well in the flour and with your fingers widely spread resembling a fork pour the oil water mixture while incorporating the flour in middle.The dough will start coming together though sticky and tacky at first(You can use a commercial mixer with the dough attachment for around 3 to 5 minutes until the dough comes into a mass). Once the dough has come together, let rest for about 3 minutes.Dust your kneading surface lightly with flour .Dont use too much flour as your dough will absorb extra flour and become dry loosing its spring/rise quality when baked. Good bread dough must be well hydrated.Knead the dough  well for around 10 minutes to develop gluten strands.Once well knead ,lightly oil your bowl  place the dough,cover with thin cling film or cotton kitchen towel dusted with flour and let the dough rise in a warm area(proofing) for 30 to 60 minutes or until it doubles in size.

For tips on Kneading there are a number of videos on Youtube that can make your work pretty easy in a giffy.

After the dough has risen transfer to a lightly oiled and slightly salted 12 by 9 Inch square baking ting.Lightly knead and spread it to fil the the tin evenly.Using your middle index finger make finger holes on the dough in straight lines or any other preferable pattern. In the impressions put sprigs of Rosemary and the tomato pieces according to your preferable pattern.

Finally, lightly spray or pour olive oil on the top ,you may pour some little salt and freshly ground black pepper on the surface top.Bake in already preheated oven at 200 Degrees Centigrade (gas mark 6) for around 30 minutes or until golden and cooked through. Once cooked remove from oven and baking tin and let rest on wire rack to avoid sweating.

Freshly Baked Focaccia Bread Resting on Wire Rack

There you have it, that's how i made my easy bake Focaccia bread as you can see in the photo it looks good and taste's real yummy.My wife carried it to work and all her colleagues couldn't help but ask for the tiniest morsels ,its so good you should try it!

Why Newspaper or Cook Book Recipes Just Wont Cut It !

Are you a home cook with a knack for experimenting new dishes?If the answer is yes i am sure you have ever been moved by a wonderful recipe some where complete with amazing photos on a food blog/website, newspaper page or recipe book and perhaps thought to yourself you should recreate it. Many of us have and often we are just not able to "hit it" like it is on the source page.You may wonder why?


Being a weekend , i like to skim through the newspaper pages on the society, lifestyle and fashion pages.Today's dailies had fancy pages on good food.The Daily Nation actually had an interview of a professional Sous Chef with one of the popular restaurants around who loves cooking Italian Cuisine/foods and he made recommendation on how to Cook a Duck Confit with some Tortellini .The Standard on the other hand had this nice caption on making a Assorted Bell Pepper Salad.

That was really fancy and i am sure many Kenyans were inspired to one day try and recreate this dishes as provided in the recipes.Based on my knowledge and background in food my simple advice is 'without some little background or knowledge of food you will never be able to recreate those dishes' based on the scanty information that was provided in those pieces.Here are some of the reasons why:

Food Stylists and professional Photographers:

Behind those fancy photos are professional food stylists (many with a professional background in food)and photographers who tweak the dishes and the photo to ensure maximum visual appeal.This Readers Digest Post may perhaps hint you on some of the tools of the trade.Well its true you may reason that perhaps you may not be able to recreate the look but at least you will be able to cook what is presented.In this regard you are also wrong,and here is the reason why!
(See this youtube Video  "Confessions of a Food Stylist")

Good Cooks have Good Knowledge:

A good cook must have background knowledge on the type of food he wants to cook,the technique and some reasonable experience in preparing the dish or similar dishes of a similar nature.Knowledge is key.
For example the recipe for Bell Pepper had some instructions on mixing vinegar,black pepper and some oil.In essence this means creating a dressing .Now without some hindsight basic knowledge on salad dressings in particular emulsions. A home cook may attempt at making a dressing but it will come no close to someone who has background knowledge on emulsions, how to mix them, keep them stable, flavor them and the appropriate vinegar/oil ratio's. All that information is not and will not be included in a recipe and often are not explained in many recipes that you will come across.The assumption is you already know these things or based on trial and error you may just hit it if you closely follow the scanty instruction.Often than not that happens!

Example two: the Chef interviewed today on the Daily Nation made a Duck confit(French confit de canard) recipe, truth be told based on what you have on that page you will not be be able to make half what can be called a duck confit(better try that Wikipedia reference page...heh heh!) .Without some knowledge on browning meat, why you do so,shallow frying, basting and slow cook stewing techniques one can come nowhere near making a duck confit!Traditionally the duck confit is actually fried using the ducks own natural oil with constant basting and then slow cooked hours on end.I laughed when i read through the recipe and wondered whether a home cook can recreate that dish with so little instruction given.No wonder i have come across some home cooks and  half baked local culinary school graduates turned " culinary professionals" preparing some fancy named dishes which come no near the self acclaimed titles.

My recommendation dear home cook if you want to be an awesome cook.Newspaper recipes or any other recipe handed over to you wont cut it.To make it you basically have three options :

• Trial and Error route which is most complex and hardy route.Typically a waste like trying to reinvent the wheel.There is already an existing vast body of knowledge on various food,cooking techniques and presentations.Make use of that otherwise subject yourself to trial and error which pretty much depends on your palate and environment.
• Become an apprentice of someone who knows how to prepare the dish it may just rub on you.
• Learn how to ...join some reputable cookery school and that could even be online.You may just be pleasantly surprised with the body of knowledge in some of the social media sites such as Youtube...great video instructions.Cook Cook Cook and improve on your cooking.

To culinate awesomely dear cook- there's no shortcut, recipes alone wont do it.You just must understand food,why you do what you do.Doing so will turn you from a nice cook to an awesome cook.Hence this blog will attempt not just at putting here recipes ,nice food photos but get you to understand some cookery basics and the reason why you do stuff.

"This is not just another food blog!"

 If you consistently read through the posts for example on "perfect seasoning"" Mirepoix and Soffrito" you will soon grow your body of  knowledge on food and turn from an average cook to an awesome one.Keep reading and constantly refer.Make it worth the while !

Spicy Sweet Githeri using Sweet Corn

Githeri is an indigenous Kenyan meal made simply by  basically stewing a combination of beans and maize seed(corn). It is mostly associated with school life especially for those who attended boarding schools. The meal originally from the Kikuyu tribe has become popular in modern times with different variations of the ingredients. The combination of beans and corn supplies a full complement of protein for the often protein-poor diet of many Kenyans. 

For many people the mention of githeri brings to mind some lacklustre meal hardly fit to be cooked for that real important guest, but this spicy sweat corn githeri twist is about to take your ordinary Githeri to a whole new level.As usual i belong to the school of thought that believes in cooking without a strict set of guidelines(a.k.a Recipe). A good chef cooks as he goes,adjusting the ingredients to best suit his or her audience, therefore adapt this recipe to fit your tests, but more than anything get to understand the technique,that's what 'often' distinguishes a home cook from a professional chef.Let me now stimulate your taste buds with my version of sweet corn githeri!

Ingredients

• Sweet Corn, cut fresh off the cob 3 to 4 ears, or a can of your preferred sweetcorn brand from your local grocery store/supermarket!
• Mexican beans, -- 2 cups(any other local brand such as RoseCoco may just do) For this first two ingredients if you buy the already processed variety there may not be need to boil the same.)
• ¼ kg meat (optional)
• Water -- to cover
• Salt and pepper -- to taste
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 2 tsp sugar
• 2tsp Garam Masala
• 1 1tsp vegetable oil/olive oil
•  1 medium (2-1/2" dia) Onions finely chopped
• 1 medium raw Red bell pepper
• 1 medium whole (2-3/5" dia) red ripe tomatoes
• 1 tbsp tomato paste
• 2 carrots
• 1 bunch of freshly plucked cilantro

Method

1. In a large pot with enough water just to cover, boil the Mexican beans. Season with salt and pepper and bring to a boil over medium heat.
2. Reduce heat to low and simmer until cooked through, 8 to 10 minutes.
3. In a different pot with enough water just to cover, simmer the sweet corn for 5 min. Season with sugar.
4. Drain the excess water on both the beans and sweet corn and mix them together.
5. Finely chop the onions, tomatoes, carrots and garlic. Sweat the onions, garlic and carrots with oil. Then add the Garam masala.Sweating basically means
6. Braise the meat on low heat and add to the onions, garlic and carrots stir and let it simmer for 5 minutes.
7. Add the tomato paste and the finely chopped tomatoes, stir for 2 mins on low heat then add the beans and sweet corn mixture. Keep stirring.
8. Add salt to taste, add a little water. Let it simmer under low heat for about 10-15 minutes. When ready, add the chopped cilantro and let the Githeri sit for five minutes, then serve with steamed cabbages or other vegetables.