Focaccia Italian Flat Fatty Bread Food Chemistry

Focaccia is a typical bakery product of many Italian regions, and it shows variants depending on the productive area. Today, focaccia is largely appreciated for its sensory properties and has its own market. It is usually consumed, still hot, as a "street food," immediately after its production. Focaccia is made of a few simple ingredients-flour, water, fatty substances (oil or lard), yeast, and salt-but a myriad of nuanced differences are obtainable by topping it, prior to cooking, with fresh tomato, onions, potatoes, olives, cheese, etc. or flavoring it with herbs (rosemary, sage, oregano, etc.). Durum wheat, re-milled semolina is used in the production of some types of focaccia. Olive oil, notably extra-virgin olive oil, is an essential ingredient in many types of focaccia. Focaccia usually appears as a circular flat bread, single layered, oily, and variously topped. The productive steps of the various focaccia types are: mixing, kneading, leavening, flattening, proofing, and baking. In the past, only a sourdough-based prolonged productive process was performed; however, today, fresh compress baker's yeast is used in the majority of bakeries to prepare focaccia. © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.