Homemade Ciabatta Bread

ATTEMPTS AT
HOMEMADE BREAD

***

Ever since I got hooked onto the idea of making homemade bread, I’ve made bread in my kitchen several times, each experiment with different recipes, flour types and even yeast variations.

But somehow each time the bread came out just so-so. You know, bread that is still edible, not rock hard, but it just never amounted to something which evoked a feeling of complete satisfaction in my being.

I’m sort of a bit thick-headed like that.

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While some others may decide very practically to give up doing something that seems futile (I mean, buying bread is so much easier than laboring over it for hours in the kitchen), I plunge right into the challenge of attempting to make bread for the fourth or fifth or sixth time (I’ve lost track already).

I like to say I’m a determined girl who just doesn’t stop until she gets what she has aimed for.

Whichever way you see it, I’m so excited (and even more relieved) to tell you that, finally, after numerous trials and errors, I’ve finally, finally found a recipe for keeps.

To be honest, I’d been feeling disappointed at how so many tries at homemade bread have turned out unsatisfactory, and while not entirely giving up hope that I’d one day find a recipe that I actually like, I’d sort of stopped searching.

***

HOMEMADE BREAD
{FINALLY A SUCCESS!}

***

Yet life’s beautiful in that way. Just when you stop desperately searching for something, you miraculously find it right before you in the most unexpected ways possible.

And so, just like that, I found the perfect homemade bread recipe staring at me in my face last Friday afternoon, when chancing upon one of the blog posts I receive in my news feed. The recipe had found me in a state of exhaustion, after a long and grueling week of work and activities, and as I stared back at the recipe, I wasn’t quite sure if it was a mirage of my imagination.

Michelle had apparently also been on a similar search for the perfect homemade ciabatta bread recipe, and after countless failed attempts at making bread, she’d eventually made one so beautiful it took my breath away. In case you’re wondering what ciabatta is, it’s basically an Italian white bread made from wheat flour and yeast. Ciabatta is somewhat elongated, broad and flat and is baked in many variations.

I’ve come to trust Michelle’s blog and her recipes which are almost always very well-instructed (you almost feel like she’s right there with you in your kitchen, holding your hand), and the last time I used one of her recipes to make these lemon squares, it turned out amazing. You can imagine that I didn’t even hesitate in printing out the ciabatta recipe and make bread as soon as I could.

That night, despite my physical tiredness and being on the verge of catching the flu, I found myself drawn to the kitchen, working elbow-deep in flour, water, olive oil and yeast.

If you’d seen me, you might have burst out laughing – my hands were sticky with off-white colored bread dough that resembled more like thick, creamy glue than dough that would eventually transform into bread. I almost panicked – the last thing I needed after a long and tiring week was almost half a kilo of inedible glue-like dough that I had to throw away.

Thankfully, Michelle had explicitly stated in the recipe that the stickiness, while not very welcomed and comfortable, was to be expected, and that, if I stuck through with it, I wouldn’t regret it. Her calm, motherly advice was enough to reduce my fears and I carried on kneading, with very wet and sticky dough clinging to every one of my fingers – I felt vaguely like Spiderman for a brief, day-dreaming instant.

With the dough kneaded and finally rested so it could rise, I was tethering around the house in nervous anticipation. Juan says I have a problem with waiting, and I give him credit for that. You see, I’m that sort of person who will peer anxiously through the glass window of the oven every two minutes to check if a cake is ready, and then open the oven every five minutes to poke a toothpick through the batter. Likewise, you can easily imagine that waiting almost two hours for the dough to rise was excruciatingly difficult for someone with anxiety issues (or rather, trouble being patient).

When the time finally arrived for me to place the risen dough on the baking tray, it had already doubled in size to become a large, fluffy ball of white.

Splitting the dough into two roughly equal parts, I sifted flour on top of them and let them lay on the greased baking tray, now tinged a bronze-brown after years of endless baking. The two rounded rectangles of dough eventually rose to twice their original size, after which I eagerly stashed the baking tray in the pre-heated oven, warm with enthusiasm of a potential success.

Some thirty minutes later, during which I spent pacing up and down the kitchen and crossing my fingers for the recipe to work, I nervously opened the oven door and peered in.

Two beautiful, golden brown loaves of homemade ciabatta bread lay waiting for me, from which emanated the rich, wholesome smell that you get from bakeries.

It was incredulous. It was unbelievable. They looked too good to be true (my skeptical mind and past failed experiences agreed).

Using a spatula to tap on the loaves, I heard the desired hollow sound the recipe said to check for – amazing! It was now done and ready to be tested.

Warm, floured and fresh, the loaves of bread were cut into thick, chunky slices.

It was airy and light, the way I like bread to be.

It tasted of nature and of all things homemade.

It reminded me of the farm in New Zealand, where I’d eaten my first piece of homemade bread with my family years ago.

It was heaven.

HOMEMADE CIABATTA BREAD (Makes 2 large loaves)
Adapted from Betty Crocker New Addition Cook Book via Bite by Michelle

Ingredients:

1) 2 scant tablespoons of active dry yeast
2) 375g of warm water
3) 400g of all-purpose flour
4) 1 teaspoon of salt (or 2 teaspoons if you prefer bread a bit saltier)
5) 1 tablespoon of olive oil

Steps:

1) Add warm water to yeast, mix well, and allow yeast to soften for 10 minutes
2) In another bowl, mix flour and salt together
3) Once yeast is soft and frothy, add olive oil and mix
4) Add flour and salt mixture to yeast mixture
5) Knead dough for 10 minutes (dough will be soft and sticky)
6) Pour enough olive oil to coat a bottom of a clean bowl
7) Place bread dough in bowl coating the bottom then turn it over so all of the dough is covered.
8) Cover with a clean tea towel and allow it to rise for 1 hour.
9) Punch the dough down, turn it over, cover again and allow dough to raise 40 minutes
1o) After 40 minutes, turn dough out on to flour surface and split dough into 2 roughly equal pieces.
11) Shape the dough into 2 loaves, and sift flour over the tops, allowing the loaves to rise until doubles in bulk
12) Pre-heat oven to 190 deg cel
13) Once loaves have doubled in size, bake in the oven for about 30 minutes until golden and produce a hollow sound when tapped

* Note: it is perfectly fine if you find the dough very sticky. That’s the way it should be.

Add warm water to yeast, mix well, and allow yeast to soften for 10 minutes:

In another bowl, mix flour and salt together:

Once yeast is soft and frothy, add olive oil and mix:

Add flour and salt mixture to yeast mixture:

Knead dough for 10 minutes (dough will be soft and sticky):

Pour enough olive oil to coat a bottom of a clean bowl, and place bread dough in bowl coating the bottom then turn it over so all of the dough is covered:

Cover with a clean tea towel and allow it to rise for 1 hour:

Until it almost doubles in size:

Punch the dough down, turn it over, cover again and allow dough to raise 40 minutes:

After 40 minutes, turn dough out on to flour surface and split dough into 2 roughly equal pieces. Shape the dough into 2 loaves, and sift flour over the tops, allowing the loaves to rise until doubles in bulk:

Once loaves have doubled in size, bake in the oven for about 30 minutes until golden and produce a hollow sound when tapped: