How to Make Focaccia with the Bread Mix in the Pantry

Folks love our focaccia mixes. All four of them, have 100% five-star reviews as of this publishing, but sometimes, it's an emergency. You're out of focaccia mixes. In an emergency, you can make a focaccia with any bread mix.

The recommend Italian Country Bread mix. It's an artisan mix designed to be crusty. It makes it a very good focaccia with a little less crispiness of your typical focaccia and an extra chewiness and sour flavor from the artisan bread.

Instructions

1. Measure 1/3 cup of olive oil. Add 2 teaspoons Italian seasoning and 1/2 teaspoons coarse salt and stir. Set aside.
2. Mix the dough according to instructions with either your bread machine or your stand-type mixer.
3. Prepare a 11x17-inch pan or 14 or 15-inch pizza pan by wiping the entire inside portion of the pan with a thin layer of shortening. Sprinkle a scattering of corn meal or coarse semolina flour on the shortening.
4. Press the dough into the pan as if you were making a pizza. Press or roll the dough out until it complete covers the bottom of the pan.
5. Cover the dough with plastic or set the pan with dough inside a proofing bag. Set the pan in a warm place and let the dough rise until doubled, at least an hour. The dough should look puffy and blisters may be about to form.
6. After the dough has risen, carefully remove the plastic or the bag. Using the ends of your fingers, dimple the dough so that there are dimples every inch and one-half inches.
7. Using a pastry brush, spread the oil and herb mixture across the top of the bread. Some oil will accumulate in some of the dimples.
8. Bake the bread in a preheated 400 degrees F oven for 15 minutes or until golden brown. Remove he bread and pan from the oven and slide the bread off of the pan and onto a cooling rack to cool.

After the bread has cooled for 15 minutes, you may cut it with a knife, shears, or a pizza wheel.