Baking bread is an extremely delicate issue where time, temperature and actions listen very closely to each other. This is a basic recipe for a ricotta bread. If you want to fully understand bread, you’ll have to learn how to bake it.
Baking bread.
Baking bread is a serious business. Many factors are important and the conditions in which a loaf of bread is baked all interact. Don’t kill us if the ricotta bread below doesn’t give the desired result. Try to take into account the tips we give along the way. And most of all, try to remember them forever.
Mixing and kneading.
Mix 400 grams of bread flour (we use Soubry white bread flour here) with 15 grams of dry yeast and 360 grams of lukewarm water. Stir into a homogeneous batter and leave it covered to rest for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, mix 200 grams of bread flour with 12 grams of salt. After the thirty minutes rest, add the flour/salt mixture and 300 grams of Berloumi’s Ricotta and 80 grams of coarsely chopped black olives to the dough. Knead into a smooth and supple dough that still feels fairly wet.
First row.
Put the dough in a container that can be closed with a little oil. Close the dough. Store at room temperature. After half an hour, fold the dough four times, along each side. Repeat after the next half hour. This rice is important for the development of the gluten network. The less time you knead, the longer this step should take.
Second row
Dust an oven grid with a little flour and turn the dough over on the oven grid. The button lace is now slightly down. The tense dough at the top. Sphere up the dough with flowered hands. Leave the knot at the bottom and push as little air out of the dough as possible. Lightly rub a little oil on top of the dough or flower by hand and cover with plastic foil. Allow to rise covered at room temperature for about an hour. Preheat your oven to the maximum temperature. The dough may have risen at most, but not ‘too far’, because then it will collapse. A delicate matter that requires some experience.
Baking the ricotta bread.
When it has risen sufficiently, put the dough in the oven. Bake for 40 minutes. Allow the ricotta bread to cool on a wire rack and resist the temptation to cut it too quickly The crust must dry out because of the heat in the bread.
To give the ricotta bread more volume (oven price) you can use a plant sprayer to slightly wet the bread. Do this immediately after you have put it in the oven and do it quickly so that the oven does not cool down too much. Those who bake with a combi steamer can give one or two jerks at the beginning of the baking process.
Ricotta bread serving tips.
Spread a generous portion of Labneh on a thick slice of ricotta bread and serve with a generous amount of salad. Season with plenty of black pepper.
Share this page if you want to!