Go Back
Apple Thyme Foccacia
Print

Apple Thyme Focaccia

This Apple Thyme Focaccia is a super impressive treat to serve guests all-year round, they’ll think they stepped into a bakery! Makes 6-8 individual focaccia.

Course Breakfast
Cuisine Italian
Keyword Apple Thyme Focaccia
Servings 8
Author Fraiche

Ingredients

For the focaccia dough:

  • 1 ¼ cups lukewarm water
  • 1 teaspoon sugar
  • 1 ½ teaspoons instant active dry yeast
  • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil plus extra for greasing the bowl
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt plus extra for sprinkling
  • 2 ½ - 3 ½ cups all-purpose flour
  • 2 cups water in a spray bottle

For the Apple Thyme Foccacia

  • 2-3 large cored apples* (unpeeled) thinly sliced
  • 2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves
  • ½ cup warmed honey
  • fleur de sel or sea salt (optional)

Instructions

  1. In a large mixing bowl, stir together the lukewarm water (somewhere between 95°F and 115°F is fine)and sugar until the sugar dissolves. Sprinkle in the yeast and let it sit until the yeast starts to ferment, for approximately 5-10 minutes.

  2. Stir the mixture and add the salt, olive oil, and 3 cups of the flour. Stir together with a wooden spoon and keep adding flour until it is too thick to stir with the spoon. Once it becomes too difficult to mix together with your spoon, place the dough on a well-floured flat surface and knead, pushing the dough using the palms of your hands, for approximately 10 minutes, until the dough looks smooth and stretchy, adding more flour as needed if the dough becomes too sticky. The goal is to have a dough that is stretchy but not stiff.

  3. Place the ball of dough in a large bowl coated with olive oil, dust the top of the dough with flour, cover the bowl with a clean damp dish towel and place in a warm draft-free area for about two hours, until the dough has doubled in size. Punch the dough down. At this point you can either refrigerate the dough overnight (or up to 2 days, covered with plastic wrap and occasionally punched down) or divide the dough into 6-7 portions (depending on how big you want your pizzas). Note, if you refrigerate the dough, make sure to bring the dough to room temperature before baking it (bring it out of the refrigerator 1-2 hours before you are ready to bake).

  4. Preheat the oven to 450 F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.

  5. Stretch the balls of dough out with your hands to form individual bases approximately 6” in diameter and place each evenly apart on the baking sheet.

To make the Apple Thyme Focaccia

  1. Arrange the apple slices on top of each focaccia and sprinkle each with thyme leaves.

  2. Using the water bottle on a mist setting, spray each of the focaccia evenly with the water (don’t be shy, this is what makes them chewy) and place the pan in the oven. Spray the focaccia again every 3 minutes three more times and bake until they are golden brown, approximately 15 minutes in total.

  3. Using a pastry brush, bush the tops of the Apple Thyme focaccia generously with the warm honey immediately upon removing them from the oven. Sprinkle very lightly with sea salt or fleur de sel if desired.

    Best if served warm from the oven!

Recipe Notes

*we used Granny Smith