Claudia Romeo: Today we're in Genoa, on the Italian Riviera.
This city is famous for many things,
like its ancient port, the aquarium,
but most of all focaccia bread.
And here, it's eaten at pretty much any time of the day.
You can have it for breakfast, as a snack,
for lunch, for dinner,
and even as dessert with Nutella.
So you know what?
It's time...oh, I don't care what time of the day it is.
It's just time for focaccia.
Let's go and see how it's made.
The old town is scattered with bakeries
churning fresh focaccia at every hour of the day.
While you may be tempted
to stop at the first shop that you see,
we're taking you to one of the oldest bakeries in Genoa,
Antico Forno della Casana.
Behind this busy focaccia counter is Ivan Sacchi,
who has been making focaccia since 1985
and has never abided by a set recipe.
Claudia: Despite being a quick eat,
making focaccia is far from a speedy process.
It requires long leavening times between each step.
These range between 10 minutes and two hours.
The process starts with Ivan making the dough
and then kneading it.
Claudia: Super elastic.
Claudia: So, you know everybody abroad
that calls it focaccia bread?
That is absolutely not true.
Claudia: So it's a better bread.
It's not bread, it's just a better bread. That's it.
Claudia: The end of the kneading of the dough
marks the beginning of the first leavening time.
This is a quick one, about 10 minutes,
after which the dough is going to be split in small batches
and put to rest on a wooden board.
Yeah, this is very soft inside.
Claudia: And not so hard on the outside, actually.
Claudia: So that is different from bread.
Claudia: This is very elastic.
It's very, like, energetic as well, very firm.
When you move them, you can feel both sides, you know.
I mean, I'm feeling them in my hands.
I don't know how I'm gonna be able to take this off.
[laughs]
So that's really a different dough.
It just smells like dough.
Dough will spend about one and a half hours
on the wooden boards.
This is the second leavening.
Claudia: When the waiting time is over,
the small batches of dough are stretched on baking trays
with a bit of olive oil.
Once stretched, the focaccia will rest
for another two hours.
This is the third and final leavening,
during which the focaccia soaks up all the flavors
of the olive oil seasoning.
Then it is cooked for 15 minutes at 230 degrees Celsius.
The focaccia comes out of the oven
with a golden crust on the outside,
and soft on the inside.
Claudia: Wow. So warm. So nice.
Claudia: Thanks for watching.
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