Preperation

You will need a bowl for mixing the ingredients, a dough cutter and an oven safe baking tray (optional).

Take out the butter and microwave for a few seconds until softened.

Add add the room temperature water with the yeast, sugar and salt, then whisk ingredients until everything dissolves in the water.

Add the flower to the bowl of wet ingredients and mix until everything is well combined.

Kneading

The dough is relatively wet meaning it will be harder. We will add the olive oil later on to prevent the mixture from becoming to sticky at any point. That that being said, this dough will need to be needed using the slap-and-fold method and will never quite form a tight ball.

If at any point the dough becomes too sticky let the dough rest for 15-20 minutes. This process is called "autolyse" where we wait for gluten to develop naturally.

Take your dough out of the bowl and start kneading it for a few minutes until the dough starts to gain some strength and will stretch, rather than tear. The total kneading time should be at around 15 minutes and you should be able to perform a window-pane test.

Bulk Fermentation

Place the dough ball in a container and let it rest for 45 minutes to 1.5 hours depending on the room temperature of the dough and the room. The dough should double in size.

Bulk Fermentation (optional)

Dust the top of your dough and countertop with flour and place it on the counter-top smooth side down. Perform a couple of folds to degas the dough and rebuild some tension in the dough. If the dough is too wet, simply wet your hands and give the dough a few folds.

Place the dough ball in a container and let it rest for 45 minutes to 1.5 hours depending on the room temperature of the dough and the room. The dough should double in size.

Final Shaping

Take the dough out with both hands and swiftly transfer this through an oiled baking tray. Try to make sure the dough spreads to all corners of the baking tray, if not wait for 15 minutes to let the dough relax and try again.

Once the dough is spread out use your fingers to poke the dough and leave holes. This will make it so that oil will gather into puddles, causing part of the dough to under cook. All of this will give the bread the distinct Focaccia characteristics.

Cover the surface of the Focaccia with oil (optional) and let it rise for the 45 or so minutes.

Baking

The oven should be preheated on 230 degrees Celsius. Create a water & oil mixture and poor this over the dough. Make sure to get in contact with most of the surface. This will create steam and stop the top from burning.

Add the spices and topping of your liking and bake the bread for around 25 minutes.