---
title: "The Focaccia That Changed How I Think About Bread"
created: 2025-06-25 09:00
author: Amelia Fontaine
keywords: focaccia, Ligurian, bread, olive oil, high hydration, overnight
description: Ligurian focaccia with rosemary — the high-hydration dough science, dimple technique, olive oil pools, and an overnight cold proof that transforms the texture.
---

# The Focaccia That Changed How I Think About Bread

I had made focaccia a dozen times before I went to Liguria, and each time it had been perfectly acceptable: flat, dimpled, herbed, slightly oily. Fine. The focaccia I ate at a bakery in Recco on a Monday morning in October was something else entirely — thin, blistered, puffy at the edges and nearly hollow in the centre, utterly saturated with local olive oil and sea salt, the texture something between bread and a cloud.

I stood outside eating it from a paper bag and immediately began trying to understand what had happened to it.

## What Makes Ligurian Focaccia Different

Standard focaccia is about 70–75% hydration (water weight as a percentage of flour weight). Ligurian focaccia — *focaccia al formaggio* and the simpler *focaccia classica* — runs at 80–85% or higher. More water means a more open crumb structure, lighter texture, and larger air pockets. It also means the dough is harder to handle: it spreads and sticks and refuses to behave like normal bread dough.

The solution is not more flour. The solution is understanding that this dough is not meant to be shaped the way a boule or a baguette is shaped. It is poured into the pan. Handled with wet hands. Stretched gently by gravity. This is a fundamentally different relationship with the dough.

The olive oil is not a finishing touch. It is a structural element. An absurd quantity of olive oil goes into the bottom of the pan before the dough, and a generous pour goes on top after dimpling. As the focaccia bakes, this oil fries the bottom of the bread while the steam from the high-water dough creates the airy interior. The result is a bread that is crisp underneath, soft and pillowy within, and absolutely soaked with oil throughout.

## The Recipe

**Ingredients:**
- 500g strong bread flour (or 00 flour)
- 430ml warm water (86% hydration)
- 10g fine salt
- 7g instant dried yeast (or 14g fresh)
- 1 tsp honey
- 8 tbsp (120ml) good quality olive oil, divided
- Flaky sea salt
- Fresh rosemary sprigs

**Equipment:** A 30×40cm baking tray (rimmed), or two smaller trays.

**Method:**

Dissolve the honey in the warm water. Add the yeast and let stand for 5 minutes. Combine flour and salt in a large bowl. Add the liquid and 4 tablespoons of the olive oil. Mix until combined — the dough will be sticky and shaggy. Do not add more flour.

Cover the bowl and leave at room temperature for 30 minutes. Then perform three sets of stretch-and-folds at 30-minute intervals: reach underneath the dough, stretch upward, fold over the top, rotate the bowl a quarter turn, repeat four times per set.

After the final fold, cover tightly and refrigerate overnight (8–16 hours). Cold fermentation develops flavour dramatically and makes the dough much easier to handle.

**The next day:**

Remove from the fridge and allow to warm for 1 hour. Pour 3 tablespoons of olive oil into the baking tray, coating the base entirely. Tip the dough onto the tray and gently stretch it toward the corners — do not force it; let it rest 5 minutes and stretch again. With a very wet or oiled hand, prod the dough to dimple it all over: press firmly, all the way to the base of the pan, every centimetre.

Mix the remaining olive oil with 4 tablespoons of water and pour this emulsion over the surface. The dimples will fill with oil-water pools — this is correct and desirable. Scatter generously with flaky salt and press rosemary sprigs into the dimples.

Leave to prove at room temperature for 45–60 minutes until noticeably puffed.

Bake at 230°C (fan 210°C) for 20–25 minutes until deep golden and blistered. The top should have some very dark patches — this is part of the character, not burning.

Cool for at least 10 minutes before eating, though it is extraordinarily good still warm.

## The Oil-Water Emulsion

The poured emulsion on top — oil and water together — is the technique I learned from reading about the Ligurian focaccerie. By the time it goes into the oven, the oil and water have separated into their constituent phases. The water steams in the oven, helping the surface bubble and blister, while the olive oil prevents the surface from drying and enables the characteristic golden-speckled finish. This is the technique that produces the texture I was eating in Recco.

## What It Taught Me

Focaccia taught me that hydration is not just a technical variable but a choice about what kind of bread you want to make. More water means more open texture means more delicacy. The trade-off is handling difficulty. Once I stopped trying to handle high-hydration dough like regular dough — stopped treating it as a problem to be solved — it became significantly more interesting to work with.

Bread, I think, rewards an attitude of curiosity more than one of mastery. It changes with the flour, the season, the humidity, the particular wild microorganisms in your starter or your water. The focaccia you make in January is not quite the focaccia you make in July. This is not a flaw. It is the thing that makes it interesting to keep making.
