Classic Ciabatta Food

CIABATTA BREAD RECIPE

Steps:

• In a medium size bowl add water and dry yeast. Wait 10 minutes until the yeast is fully dissolved and has a "creamy' texture.
• Mix in the flour. You should get a very loose and sticky dough. It should have consistency thick enough not to come off from the spoon as, say, sour cream or greek yogurt, but wet enough so that it's impossible to knead it by hand.
• Cover the bowl with a plastic wrap and let the dough rest at a room temperature for 3-4 hrs or overnight. I just don't recommend leaving biga for more than 24 hrs as the yeast will start to over-mature and loose its power.
• Once biga is rested it will become bubbly and might become even looser when you left it. Now pour lukewarm water in the bowl, going around the edges of the bowl and pouring small portions at a time. This is how we hydrate and aerate biga even more at the same time liberating it from the bowl.
• Pour biga and wate mix into a bowl of a standing mixer, oil the dough hook.Turn on your mixer on low speed, knead for a 1-2 minutes and start adding flour.
• In the last portion of flour (approx 1cup) add salt and mix it into the flour. Add to the dough.Knead on medium speed for 10 minutes. You'll notice the dough starting changing its texture. Becoming more smooth and starting to climb up the hook. Increase mixer speed to high and knead for another 10 minutes. If you mixer bowl is large enough you'll see the dough coming off the bowl sides. That's a perfect sign the dough is ready and has developed strong gluten.You would be able to tell just from the look that it's very silky and shiny.
• Transfer the dough to a big oiled bowl, so that there is enough space for the bread to double or triple.Cover with plastic wrap and let it rise at a room temperature for about 40-50 minutes.
• After the first 40-50 minutes the dough will double in size. Deep a silicon spatula in a water and start folding the dough onto itself, from the outside to the center of the bowl. You should be able to make 6-10 folds.
• Do it gently, so that the dough becomes well aerated and not deflated.Now using both hands, rise the dough from the bowl letting it fold, turn the bowl 90 degrees and fold in the same manner again. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for another 40-50 minutes.
• Repeat this last folding process once again and let the dough rest for the last 40-50 minutes.
• Once it's perfectly bubbly and screams to get out of the bowl, GENEROUSLY sprinkle the working surface with the flour. You'll regret if you wouldn't. The dough is veery sticky, but that's the secret for gorgeous light and airy ciabatta bread.
• Flip the bowl upside down and let the dough "slide" off of the bowl by itself.
• Sprinkle your scrapers and top of the dough with flour again. Constantly assisting with the scrapers give it a rectangular shape. Cut into elongated loaves or individual rolls. You can make the rolls either square or triangle and they are HEAVEN for panini.
• Generously sprinkle linen cloth with flour and using large dough scrapers transfer the bread loaves onto it. Separate each loaf with a towel fold (see the pictures) or use individual towel for each of the loaves.
• Turn on the oven to 450F while ciabatta bread rests on the towel.
• After 10-15 minutes flip ciabatta loaves over on parchment paper sprinkled with semolina or corn flour (to prevent bread from sticking).
• Just before you put the bread into the oven, spray the oven generously with cold water to create as much steam as you can. Steam really helps ciabatta bread to cook perfectly both on the inside and outside.
• Bake ciabatta for 20-25 minutes without EVER opening the oven. After 10 minutes in the oven reduce the heat to 400F. When it's golden brown, or may seem even slightly burned that is it. Your ciabatta bread has just reached its perfection and all you have left is let it cool for 15-20 on the wire rack.

CLASSIC CIABATTA

Steps:

• To make the starter, stir the yeast into the warm water and let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.
• Stir in the tepid water. Then add the flour, a cup at a time.
• Beat by hand, in an electric mixer or in a food processor, to form a sticky dough. Place in a lightly oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap and set aside in a cool place to rise until tripled in volume, 6 to 24 hours. Starter can be made in advance and refrigerated until ready to use.
• To make the dough, mix yeast with warm water in the bowl of an electric mixer. Set aside 10 minutes.
• Add oil and the prepared starter and a little of the tepid water. Start mixing at very slow speed, adding the rest of the tepid water gradually until these ingredients are well blended. Mix flour with salt, add them, and mix for 2 to 3 minutes.
• Attach a dough hook to the mixer and mix for 2 minutes at slow speed, then 2 minutes at medium speed. Scoop the dough out onto a floured work surface and knead briefly. The dough should be very moist and elastic.
• Place dough in a lightly oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap and set aside to rise until doubled, 1 1/2 to 2 hours. The dough should still be sticky but full of air bubbles.
• Place dough on a well-floured work surface and cut into four equal portions. Roll each into a cylinder, then stretch the cylinders into rectangles about 4 by 10 inches.
• If you can bake the bread on stones, generously flour four pieces of parchment paper and place each shaped loaf on a sheet of the paper, seam side up. Otherwise, oil a baking sheet, dust it with flour and cornmeal and place the loaves on the baking sheet. Cover loosely with damp tea towels and allow to rise about 2 hours, until doubled.
• Preheat oven to 425 degrees with a baking stone in it if you have one. Dust the stone with cornmeal. Gently roll the breads from the parchment onto the stone so the seam is down and the floured side is up. Otherwise, simply place the baking sheet with the breads in the oven. Bake until the breads are golden brown, about 30 minutes, spraying them with water a few times during the first 10 minutes. Cool on racks.

CIABATTA

Steps:

• Sprinkle the yeast on top of the 1 3/4 ounces of hot water to let it dissolve, and set aside. Sprinkle the salt on top of the flour and stir to incorporate. Make a well in the center of the flour - salt mixture, and add the cool water little by little.
• After the yeast has dissolved into the warm water, add it to the mixture, stir to incorporate, then stop and let the mixture sit for 30 minutes. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and write the time with permanent marker on the top.
• After 30 minutes, sprinkle flour on your work surface, then scrape the dough out onto it. Tap your hands in a little flour, then gently flatten the dough into a rectangle, with the short side facing you. Using a bench scraper, flip the top edge down to just below the center, then flip the bottom side up above the center. Do the same with each side, then turn dough over and dust off the flour. Place the folded dough in a a bowl slicked with vegetable oil and let it sit for 30 minutes, again, covered with plastic wrap with the time written on it.
• Fold the dough again, using the same method as above. Place the dough in a second oiled bowl, covered with plastic, and let it ferment until it has doubled in volume, 1 to 2 hours.
• As the dough is rising, preheat the oven to 475 degrees, and put a baking stone on the middle rack, and an empty pan (for water) on the bottom rack. After the dough has doubled in volume, sprinkle a little more flour onto your workspace. Then, sprinkle a lot of flour onto the back of a baking sheet. Scrape the dough out onto the counter, tap your hands in flour, and gently flatten the dough into a large, even rectangle of approximately 12" x 8" x 1" high. Use a bench scraper or a knife to cut the dough into 4 equal pieces, approximately 3" wide and 8" long. Fold each piece, top-down to center, then bottom-up to above-center, in the same way you folded the dough in step 3. Place each folded piece seam-side down on the floured baking sheet. Cover with oiled plastic wrap and let it rise for 30 to 60 minutes, or until the dough has doubled in volume.
• Sprinkle more flour on the counter. Take one ciabatta piece at a time and stretch it very gently to lengthen. Turn it upside-down and place back onto the back of the floured sheet tray.
• After all of the pieces have been stretched, sprinkle 4 tablespoons of a mixture of half cornmeal and half flour on the baking stone. Shuttle the ciabatta pieces off the sheet tray and onto the stone. To shuttle, first gently move the sheet tray back and forth to loosen the dough, then, as the pan is held above the baking stone, a quick shake up and down should help slide the dough onto the actual stone. (If you prefer, you can pick up and balance the piece of dough with two hands or even try to move it with the help of a spatula; you just want to get the loaves onto the stone.) Pour water into the pan on the bottom rack in order to make steam; you can also spritz the loaves with water. Avert your face as you pour the water and quickly close the oven door.
• The dough should bake to a very dark brown in approximately 30 minutes. Let the bread cool before cutting into it.

CIABATTA, POOLISH VERSION

Steps:

• Remove the poolish from the refrigerator 1 hour before making the dough to take off the chill.
• To make the dough, stir together the flour, salt, and yeast in a 4-quart mixing bowl. Add the poolish and 6 tablespoons of the water. With a large metal spoon (or on low speed with the paddle attachment), mix until the ingredients form a sticky ball. If there is still some loose flour, add the additional water as needed and continue to mix. If you are mixing by hand, repeatedly dip one of your hands or the metal spoon into cold water and use it, much like a dough hook, to work the dough vigorously into a smooth mass while rotating the bowl in a circular motion with the other hand (see page 56). Reverse the circular motion a few times to develop the gluten further. Do this for 5 to 7 minutes, or until the dough is smooth and the ingredients are evenly distributed. If you are using an electric mixer, mix on medium speed with the paddle attachment for 5 to 7 minutes, or as long as it takes to create a smooth, sticky dough. Switch to the dough hook for the final 2 minutes of mixing. The dough should clear the sides of the bowl but stick to the bottom of the bowl. You may need to add additional flour to firm up the dough enough to clear the sides of the bowl, but the dough should still be quite soft and sticky.
• Sprinkle enough flour on the counter to make a bed about 8 inches square. Using a bowl scraper or spatula dipped in water, transfer the sticky dough to the bed of flour and proceed with the stretch-and-fold method shown below. Mist the top of the dough with spray oil, again dust with flour, and loosely cover with plastic wrap or a food-grade plastic bag.
• Let rest for 30 minutes. Stretch and fold the dough again; mist with spray oil, dust with flour, and cover. Allow the covered dough to ferment on the counter for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. It should swell but not necessarily double in size.
• Set up a couche as described on page 38. Carefully remove the plastic from the dough and proceed as shown below in the Shaping Ciabatta sidebar. Mist the top of the dough with spray oil and dust the dough with more flour, then cover the cloth with a towel.
• Proof for 45 to 60 minutes at room temperature, or until the dough has noticeably swelled.
• Prepare the oven for hearth baking as described on pages 91-94, making sure to have an empty steam pan in place. Preheat the oven to 500°F.
• Generously dust a peel or the back of a sheet pan with semolina flour or cornmeal and very gently transfer the dough pieces to the peel or pan, using the pastry scraper if you need support. Lift the dough from each end and tug the dough out to a length of 9 to 12 inches. If the dough bulges too high in the middle, gently dimple it down with your fingertips to even out the height of the loaf. Slide the 2 doughs (or bake one at a time if you prefer) onto the baking stone (or bake directly on the sheet pan). Pour 1 cup hot water into the steam pan and close the door. After 30 seconds, open the door, spray the side walls of the oven with water, and close the door. Repeat twice more at 30-second intervals. After the final spray, turn the oven setting down to 450°F and bake for 10 minutes. Rotate the loaves 180 degrees, if necessary, for even baking and continue baking for 5 to 10 minutes longer, or until done. The bread should register 205°F in the center and should be golden in color (but the flour streaks will also give it a dusty look). The loaves will feel quite hard and crusty at first but will soften as they cool.
• Transfer the bread from the oven to a cooling rack and allow to cool for at least 45 minutes before slicing or serving.
• Dust the top of the dough liberally with flour, patting the dough into a rectangle. Wait 2 minutes for the dough to relax.
• Coat your hands with flour and lift the dough from each end, stretching it to twice its size.
• Fold the dough over itself, letter style, to return it to a rectangular shape.
• Using a pastry scraper that has been dipped in water, divide the dough into 2 or 3 rectangles, taking care not to degas the dough. Sprinkle the dough generously with more flour and, using the scraper to get under the dough, gently lift each piece from the counter and then roll it on both sides in the loose flour to coat.
• Lay the loaves on the cloth and gently fold each piece of dough, from left to right, letter style, into an oblong about 6 inches long.
• Bunch the cloth between the pieces to provide a wall.
• You can add 1/4 cup (2 ounces) of olive oil to the formula and/or substitute whole milk or buttermilk for some or all of the water (even the poolish can be made with milk). In either instance, the oil- or milk-enriched product will be softer and more tender than the lean, water-only version. If you are adding the oil, you may need to also add a small amount of flour-as always, let the dough dictate if it needs any flour or liquid adjustments.
• As you become comfortable with wet dough, you may want to try increasing the hydration and stickiness of the dough. The wetter the better, as long as it holds together enough to make the stretch-and-fold maneuvers. It is during the stretching and folding that the gluten has a chance to strengthen, resulting in the large holes so distinctive and prized in this bread.
• This dough is very simple to make in a food processor. See page 55 for instructions.
• There are a number of fabulous variations that can be made by adding mushrooms, cheese, and sautéed onions, as described on the following pages.
• Ciabatta, Poolish Version %
• Poolish: 169%
• Bread flour: 100%
• Salt: 3.3%
• Instant yeast: 1.3%
• Water (approx.): 33.3%
• Total: 306.9%
• Lean, rustic dough; indirect method; commercial yeast
• Day 1: 2 to 4 hours poolish or biga
• Day 2: 1 hour to de-chill poolish or biga; 10 to 15 minutes mixing; 3 to 4 hours fermentation, shaping, and proofing; 20 to 30 minutes baking