Disclosure: This post contains some affiliate links. I will receive a small commission if you make a purchase as a result of clicking one of these links. There is no additional cost to you.
This Garlic & Herb Focaccia Bread is absolutely irresistible. Soft on the inside with a gorgeous golden brown crust, this bread is topped with mellow roasted garlic and fresh herbs like parsley and thyme. It's so easy to make, you're gonna want it every weekend.
Being a food blogger is pretty awesome. I honestly can't wait until I can make it my full-time job. The only problem is that I'm constantly hungry. Everytime I look at the pictures of this bread, I wish I was eating it. That's true of most of my posts, to be fair, because I only share with you the foods we absolutely love. But I don't get a chance to make the same thing over and over again, as much as I might like to. It's always onto the new and the next. Gotta keep that content machine turning.
Lucky for me, I'm also a compulsive list-maker, so I have lists of probably thousands of recipes that I want to try, test, and tweak to perfection. I get so excited to share them with you guys. Hopefully you've found something here that you get just as excited about.
What makes this bread so awesome?
I think this Garlic & Herb Focaccia Bread might become one of those things. It's an easy weekend baking project, and it makes your house smell amazing. Imagine it, the smell of roasted garlic and fresh-baked bread wafting from your kitchen on a Sunday afternoon. That's setting yourself up for some serious joy right there.
I guess I should say that this might not be strictly focaccia bread, so my apologies to any Italians. I just thought it was the most understandable way to describe it. It's ever so slightly adapted from How to Be a Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson, and she refers to it as hearth bread. Either way, it's a rustic, oblong, dimpled loaf topped with a roasted garlic and fresh herb paste. It's got a gorgeous crisp crust and a pillowy inside. You can slice it if you want, but I'm happy to just tear off chunk after chunk, inevitably eating too much and enjoying myself with every bite.
How to make Garlic & Herb Focaccia Bread
There's nothing complicated here, but yeasted bread is always time consuming. We start by making a simple dough witha bit of oil worked into it. I use my stand mixer to knead the dough, but you can do it by hand if you like. While that's tucked away getting it's first rise, we're going to roast two small bulbs of garlic. Slice a bit off the top of each bulb, drizzle them with olive oil, and tuck them into a sealed foil pouch. They're going in the oven for about 45 minutes to get soft and sweet and mellow.
To make the garlic and herb paste that tops the bread, we just add whatever fresh herbs sound delicious to us to the bowl of a food processor. I went with parsley and thyme, but you can get creative. Squeeze in your garlic cloves once they're cool enough to handle, and give everything a good chop with the processor. Then drizzle in some extra virging olive oil to form a spreadable paste.
Once your bread dough is risen, stretch it into an oblong or rectangular shape, then cover it and let it puff up again. Then, when you're ready to bake, poke your fingers all over it to create those signature dimples. Spread your garlic paste all over the top, and bake until puffed and golden. To finish it off, you can add a drizzle of good oil and some flaky sea salt. You won't be able to keep your hands off it.
Make it magical
Garlic is well-known in pop culture as a symbol of protection, but it can do more than just keep you safe from vampires. It's also used for luck, as well as sex magic and lust spells. Added to a tomato sauce, you've got a powerful love spell cooking away in your cauldron. Garlic can protect from all sorts of negative energy, people and spirits, so it's probably a good idea to keep it in your kitchen all the time. (Sources: Moody Moons, The Magick Kitchen)
In the busy world we live in, fresh bread can feel like such a luxury. You totally deserve to indulge in some Garlic & Herb Focaccia Bread. It's gonna be so awesome.
Looking for more simple bread recipes? Try some Whole Wheat Guinness Soda Bread or a loaf of pillowy Potato Bread.
PrintGarlic & Herb Focaccia Bread
This Garlic & Herb Focaccia Bread is absolutely irresistible. Soft on the inside with a gorgeous golden brown crust, this bread is topped with mellow roasted garlic and fresh herbs like parsley and thyme. It's so easy to make, you're gonna want it every weekend.
- Prep Time: 20
- Rising time: 85
- Cook Time: 55
- Total Time: 1 hour 45 minutes
- Yield: 1 loaf 1x
- Category: Side Dish
- Method: Baked
- Cuisine: Italian
- Diet: Vegetarian
Ingredients
For the bread:
- 1-½ teaspoons dried active yeast (see note)
- ⅔ cup warm water
- 2-½ tablespoons olive oil
- 1-¾ cups white bread flour
- 1-½ teaspoons fine sea salt
For the topping:
- 2 small heads of garlic
- About 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling on the garlic
- ¼ cup fresh flat leaf parsley
- 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves
- Coarse sea salt for sprinkling
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 375 F (190 C).
- Add your yeast to a small dish and cover it with about a tablespoon of warm water. Give it a swirl to combine. Let this sit on the counter while you measure out the rest of your ingredients to activate the yeast.
- Measure out ⅔ cup warm water in a measuring jug, then add the 2-½ tablespoons olive oil to that.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer or a large mixing bowl, measure out your flour, and add the salt. Then add the foamy yeast mixture and the water and oil. If you're using your stand mixer, attach the dough hook, and start mixing. Once it comes together, you can turn your mixer up to medium low and let the dough hook knead the dough for about five minutes or until the dough is smooth. You could also knead this by hand if you prefer or don't have a stand mixer.
- Form the dough into a ball, and pop it into a lightly oiled bowl. Turn it over once to oil the dough on both sides, then cover with a clean tea towel and leave it on the counter to rise for about an hour or until roughly doubled in size.
- While the bread is rising, we'll roast our garlic. Slice a bit off the top of the garlic heads to expose the cloves inside, then place them on a sheet of foil, drizzle them with a bit of extra virgin olive oil, then seal up the garlic packet. You want to leave some space around the garlic but seal up the foil completely. You can place your foil packets directly into the oven to roast for about 45 minutes. Your house will smell awesome. When the time is up, take the packets out of the oven and open them up to start to cool off.
- Turn your oven up to 400 F (200 C) for baking the bread.
- Add your parsley and thyme to the bowl of a food processor, then squeeze your roasted garlic cloves in as well. Pulse the food processor several times to chop this all up. Then with the processor running, add your two tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil down the chute and blitz until it creates a garlicy paste. You may need a bit more oil or a bit less depending on the exact amount of garlic and herbs you've ended up with, so just add a bit at a time.
- After your dough has risen, punch it down, then leave it to rest for 10 minutes. After that, you can pop it onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and roll or stretch it into a roughly rectangular or oblong shape. Cover this with a clean tea towel and leave it to rise again for about 25 minutes.
- Now we're ready to top and bake. Poke your fingers into your risen bread dough to create fat little dimples. Maybe give your garlic mixture one last pulse with the food processor just in case things started to separate while they were waiting, then spread all that garlicy goodness evenly over your bread dough. Let some of it collect in the dimples.
- Pop your baking sheet into the oven and let your bread bake for about 20 minutes. It will be golden and puffy. You can drizzle over a bit more extra virgin olive oil and sprinkle it with flaky sea salt. Slice it up if you like, but I like to just tear into it as soon as it's cooled enough to handle.
Notes
If you have packets of rapid-rise yeast, you can use half a packet or 1-⅛ teaspoons here. Just add it straight to the dry ingredients. no need to soak it in water first.
Keywords: Focaccia, Garlic Bread
If you make this recipe, please leave a comment and a rating to let me know how it goes. This helps other readers find this recipe. Happy eating!
Leave a Reply