Bacon and toasted onion sourdough focaccia topped with freshly ground black pepper and nicely covered with parmesan cheese. This focaccia is very tasty.
Here’s a great thing to do with some high hydration sourdough bread dough. Focaccia is a very delicious way to use some of a batch of bread dough instead of always making 2 loaves as my recipe makes. I quite often play around with focaccia. This time I decided to go a different route than the normal rosemary or olive focaccia. I had some bacon and a bunch of onions that needed to be used up, so I made this very delicious sourdough bacon and toasted onion focaccia.
Focaccia traditionally is made with a high hydration bread dough, making sourdough a fantastic candidate. The added sourdough flavor makes sourdough focaccia very delicious. Toppings for focaccia usually are kept very simple, and there are many variations. The most common are generally involving some herbs such as rosemary or maybe some herbs de province and loads of olive oil. I was out of herbs, and the flavored of bacon and onions in this version really shines. I didn’t feel like it needed any herbs.
This focaccia came together really quickly, except for the retarding of the dough. I pulled the dough out of the fridge to warm up. By the time I had cooked the bacon and the onions, the focaccia dough was ready and willing to accept all the tasty toppings. The pan I used is this awesome 1/4 sheet pan from USA Pans, it has a great non-stick surface and I use it all the time for smaller baking. The pan is fantastic for a small batch of cookies or tater tots for 1 or 2 people and it’s the perfect size when a 1/2 sheet pan is just to big. It is one of my most useful pans. (I get a very small comission if you use the link from amazon which helps pay for this blog, please consider using links on this page to help fund What To Munch)
The dough can be made at your leisure days earlier. (up to 3 days ahead so you can quickly put the rest together for company, or a great snack or dinner with some glorious wine without much fuss. Of course, you can put many different toppings on focaccia. I might make this version with adding mushrooms sometime soon!
Let me know in the comments below what you like on your focaccia. I would love to hear from you.
Bacon and toasted onion sourdough focaccia topped with freshly ground black pepper and nicely covered with parmesan cheese. This focaccia is very tasty.
- ½ recipe 80% hydration sourdough bread dough after 24 hours or more retard see note*
- 5 slices of thick-sliced bacon chopped into 1-inch pieces or thin
- 1 large onion thickly sliced and roughly chopped
- 1 tablespoon olive oil plus extra
- 1 cup grated parmesan cheese
- Freshly ground pepper
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Preheat oven to 400o.
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Brush some olive oil over the sides and bottom of a 12.5 x 9 x 1-inch ¼ sheet pan. (you can use any sheet pan and not fill it or double the recipe for a ½ sheet pan)
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Place the dough into the oiled ¼ sheet pan and pat it out to fit all the way to the edges. Dimple the dough with your fingers to give it some divots or hills and valleys.
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Drizzle more olive oil all over the dough.
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Let sit out while you prepare the bacon and onion.
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In a large skillet fry the bacon until crisp, reserve 1 tablespoon of the drippings (or use 1 tablespoon olive oil) drain the crisp bacon on paper towels.
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Sauté the onion until softened and just beginning to brown on the edges. Set aside to let cool briefly.
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Crumble up the bacon and sprinkle the bacon evenly over the focaccia dough. Top with the slightly cooled onions.
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Sprinkle generously with ¾ cup of the parmesan cheese.
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Generously grind some fresh pepper over the top.
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Bake, the focaccia for 15 to 2o minutes, or until the focaccia is golden brown.
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Immediately sprinkle the remaining ¼ cup of parmesan cheese over the top. Remo e the focaccia to a cutting board and cut into rectangles. Serve hot.
A full recipe for 80% hydration sourdough dough is:
800 grams bread flour
200 grams all-purpose flour
800 grams water
150 grams very active sourdough starter
15 grams sea salt (a little over 1 tablespoon)
Use a full recipe of sourdough bread dough @whattomunch.com at 80% hydration (or higher!) and either make one boule and one focaccia or make 2 focaccias. The dough is enough to make one large ½ sheet pan of focaccia (which is a lot of focaccia!). You can cut the dough recipe in half, for complete directions on how to make sourdough bread dough see whattomunch.com guide to making sourdough bread.
I retard my dough for at least 24 hours, usually 36. If you are in a pinch, you can skip that more prolonged retardation, but it will not have the best flavor.
