Garden Focaccia Bread Sticks
There is little I’ve found more comforting than bread, in all forms, these past two months. I know that anyone following us on Instagram is probably sick of seeing our peanut butter banana bread, so I’ve come up with a solution: a new bread for you to look at. This time, focaccia bread sticks—and at this moment, focaccia breadsticks with an unnecessary garden theme.
Check out the recipe below and let me know if you give it a try! The recipe itself is extremely simple straight-to-the-point focaccia, and this is one of those things you can get creative with in terms of toppings. Things like fresh herbs, garlic, thinly sliced vegetables. You get it. We’re baking it in a 9x9” brownie pan to keep the edges nice and soft like a fluffy breadstick.
Garden Focaccia Breadsticks
takes 2 hours including rising time // makes 8-12 pieces
1 cup warm water heated to 105-110° F (see notes)
1/4 oz active dry yeast (you can use instant yeast) (see notes)
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 cup olive oil + more for greasing pan and brushing top of bread
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (see notes)
1 teaspoon kosher salt
Raw vegetable & herb toppings (see notes)
Whisk the water, yeast, and honey to combine. Let sit for 5-10 minutes until it has gotten bubbly, and then whisk in the olive oil. (f using instant yeast, no need to wait, just whisk with the water, honey, and olive oil and move on to step 2.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook attachment (see notes for doing this by hand), whisk together the flour and salt. Pour in the yeast mixture and mix to combine before turning the mixer to high and kneading for five minutes, until elastic. At the end of the five minutes, it’ll be slightly messy still, but the dough should have an elastic feel and smooth appearance.
Transfer the dough to a mixing bowl coated with olive oil (oiling up your hands makes this easier and less sticky) and cover with a towel—let rise for one hour in the warmest part of your home, until doubled in size.
Once the dough has risen, grease a 9x9” baking pan. Transfer your dough into the baking pan and gently press to fit the pan, slowly stretching it out. Cover and let rise for another 30 minutes.
While the dough rises, set your oven to 450 degrees F and prep your toppings. I used scallions, capers, cherry tomatoes, and sweet peppers to make some fun designs, but feel free to just throw on some flakey salt and call it a day, or add a little flavor with minced garlic and basil leaves.
Once you’ve added all your toppings, drizzle with a little more olive oil and bake for 15-20 minutes, until golden brown. Remove from the oven, let cool slightly, and cut into desired pieces. For the “breadsticks” we just cut it into four squares and then cut each of those in half to create 8 nice big pieces.
Notes
Water temperature—it’s extremely important that your water is between 105-110°F, as anything much hotter will easily kill the yeast, and anything cooler won’t activate it. We have an electric kettle that lets us set the temperature, but if you don’t then a cheap kitchen thermometer will do the trick!
Yeast—I know yeast is hard to come by for some folks right now, but if you do have it, either active dry yeast or instant yeast will do. You don’t need to proof instant yeast, but for simplicity I’ve just included it in the instructions the same way you would use active dry yeast. If you are using active dry yeast, the water and honey will feed it and after five minutes you should have bubbly, kinda goopy stuff happening in your bowl. If there’s no change and it looks the same after 5 minutes as it did when you first whisked it all together, it means the yeast was either already dead or you killed it with water that was too hot. You’ll want to start over and use new yeast if this happens.
Flour—correctly measuring flour is incredibly important to avoid overly-dense focaccia! The way to do it is: use a spoon to fluff up your flour in the container, then gently use that same spoon to scoop flour into your measuring cup, making sure you’re not compacting the flour at all. Once your measuring cup is full, level it off with a knife to make sure it is exactly to the brim. This method ensures you’re not using more flour than called for.
Toppings—Look these are really up to you and you can probably tell what I used from just looking at the pictures (and I’ve got more in depth detail below!). Keep in mind anything you use will need to be able to be cooked (and not get totally scorched) in a 450 degree oven for 20 minutes. I found the tomatoes and capers to be a particularly nice touch flavor wise!
Kneading By Hand—this is totally an option if you don’t have a mixer! I just use the dough hook because I’m a lazy moron and also the dough for this is a bit messy. Once your yeast mixture has been added and mixed into the flour in step 2, dump out the dough onto a lightly flour surface and use the heels of your hand to knead for about 5-8 minutes, until the dough is elastic and somewhat smooth.
Decorating Tips
While we went with a distinct floral theme, you can really go any direction you’d like! In general, aim for a variety of colors and sizes to help bring your bread pattern to life. Mixed red and yellow sliced cherry tomatoes were great for creating flowers while using sliced sweet peppers and capers as the petals. Chivess and thyme turn into flower stems, while green onions are perfect for tall grass. Capers are fun to add whimsy as stars or petals and add a great briny salty flavor. Finally, a mild sweet herb like basil makes for fantastic leaves or to just scatter about :)
Liquid content of vegetables vary, but we found everything we used cooked up rather nicely and didn’t “leak” or send liquid running down the edges of the bread. I’d be weary of using vegetables that have a longer cook time, like carrots, as they might not be that great to eat even if they can make the design really fun.
Thanks for stopping by the blog, and as always, let us know if you give this a try!
xoxo Beau & Matt
