Focaccia with Olive Oil and Rosemary

There are days when you can get a little tired of that brown sandwich with cheese, sausage or jam. But, if you have an hour to yourself in the weekend before friends or family come to disturb your rest, you might decide to bake a delicious focaccia.

A focaccia is, as you might have guessed, an Italian flatbread. Its origins probably lie in Liguria, the region around the northern Italian city of Genoa. The word 'focaccia' is derived from the Latin focus , which once meant 'hearth'. Just as a pizza was once baked on a stone in a hearth, so too was the focaccia prepared.

No wonder that a focaccia has some similarities with a pizza, but the base of the focaccia is a lot thicker than that of a pizza. The preparation of a focaccia is very simple and you only need a limited number of ingredients.

Not only tasty, but also healthy
The focaccia with olive oil and rosemary is one of the traditional variants. And there are a few more unexpected advantages of this version. Not only is the extra virgin olive oil used super healthy (see here , here or here ), but the rosemary also has some recognized health benefits. Rosemary contains carvacrol , which has a strong antibacterial effect. In addition, scientists believe that carvacrol may even play a role in the treatment of diabetes.

So get started quickly and surprise those around you with a delicious (and healthy) focaccia with olive oil and rosemary, or a focaccia con olio d'oliva e rosmarino .

Ingredients:
- 10 tablespoons of extra virgin Tunisian Yakelos olive oil
- 3 sprigs of rosemary (strip the leaves from the sprigs)
- 300 grams of flour
- 7 grams of dry yeast
- Sea salt .

Preparation:
- Mix 7 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil with the fresh rosemary in a bowl. Put the bowl aside for a moment and let the rosemary soak in the olive oil.
- Mix the flour with the yeast, 3 tablespoons of olive oil and 1 teaspoon of sea salt in another bowl. Gradually add 175 ml of water to the mixture.
- Knead the dough for 6 to 8 minutes. The dough will be sticky at first, but after a while of kneading it will become softer and more elastic. Then place the dough in a clean, oiled bowl and cover the bowl with a tea towel. Let the dough rise at room temperature for about an hour or until it has doubled in volume.
- Grease a baking sheet with oil. Remove the dough from the bowl and knead it briefly on your work surface. Place the dough on a sheet of baking paper and place it on the baking sheet. Roll out the dough into a rectangle of 20 by 28 cm. Let the dough rise on the baking sheet, outside the oven, for about 30 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 220°C. Use your fingertips to make dents in the dough. Sprinkle the dough with the rosemary oil and sprinkle with some extra fresh rosemary and some sea salt. Bake the focaccia in the oven for about 20 minutes until golden brown.
- Remove the focaccia from the oven and cover loosely with aluminum foil (this ensures that no steam can escape and the crust remains nice and soft). Let the focaccia cool completely. Just before serving, sprinkle with a little extra virgin Tunisian Yakelos olive oil again.

Extra:
Tip 1: Make extra olive oil with rosemary and use this as a dip for your focaccia.
Tip 2: Decorate your focaccia with olives or even grapes.