Olive Focaccia (Recipe)
Good olive focaccia comes down to three things: a wet, slow-risen dough, generous olive oil, and olives pressed deep enough that they don’t scorch. This is a forgiving recipe. You mix a slack dough by hand, let time and a little yeast do the heavy lifting over a few hours (or overnight in the fridge), then dimple it with oiled fingers, tuck in olives and rosemary, and bake it hot until the top is burnished and the underside is crisp. No stand mixer, no sourdough starter, no drama. Below is the method, a working table of quantities and timings, and answers to the questions people ask most.
Ingredients and quantities
These amounts make one standard tray, roughly 30 x 20 cm, enough for six to eight people as a side or snack. The dough is deliberately wet — around 75% hydration — which is what gives focaccia its open, springy crumb. Resist the urge to add lots of extra flour.
| Ingredient | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Strong white bread flour | 400 g | High protein gives structure to the wet dough |
| Water (lukewarm) | 300 g (300 ml) | Roughly 75% hydration |
| Fine salt | 8 g (about 1½ tsp) | Plus flaky salt for the top |
| Instant dried yeast | 5 g (about 1½ tsp) | Or 15 g fresh yeast |
| Extra-virgin olive oil | 50–60 ml | For the dough, the tin and the top |
| Pitted olives | 120–150 g | Black or green; drained and patted dry |
| Fresh rosemary | 2–3 sprigs | Leaves picked, or short sprigs left whole |
On olives: use a variety with real flavour and a firm flesh so they hold up in the oven. A soft, brine-cured black olive works beautifully, as does a meaty green. It’s worth remembering that an olive’s name tells you the cultivar, not always where the fruit was grown — plenty of familiar types are farmed well beyond their region of origin. If you want to match an olive to the bake, our olive varieties encyclopedia is a good place to browse. Whatever you choose, pat them dry; wet olives make for a soggy patch.
Method, step by step
The timings below assume a room-temperature rise. If your kitchen is cold, everything simply takes a little longer — go by how the dough looks, not the clock.
- Mix the dough. In a large bowl, stir the yeast into the lukewarm water and leave for a minute. Add the flour and salt, then about 2 tablespoons of the olive oil. Mix with a spoon or wet hand until you have a shaggy, sticky dough with no dry flour left. It will look too wet — that’s right.
- Strengthen it with folds. Rather than kneading, do three or four sets of “stretch and folds” over the first hour: wet your hand, grab one side of the dough, stretch it up and fold it over the middle, turning the bowl a quarter each time. Roughly 30 seconds each set, spaced 15–20 minutes apart. The dough will grow smoother and more elastic.
- Bulk rise. Cover the bowl and leave until roughly doubled and puffy — about 2 to 3 hours at room temperature. For the best flavour and easiest handling, cover and rest it in the fridge overnight (up to about 24 hours), then let it come back to room temperature before shaping.
- Prepare the tin. Pour a good 2 tablespoons of olive oil into your baking tin and spread it across the base and up the sides. Tip the risen dough in and gently coax it towards the corners. If it springs back, leave it 10 minutes and try again — don’t fight it.
- Second rise. Cover loosely and let the dough relax and puff in the tin for 45 minutes to an hour, until pillowy.
- Dimple and top. Heat your oven to around 220 °C (200 °C fan). Oil your fingertips and press straight down through the dough to the base, all over, to make the classic dimples. Drizzle over more olive oil so it pools in the holes. Press the olives and rosemary firmly into the dimples — pushing them in rather than sitting them on top stops them burning. Finish with a scatter of flaky salt.
- Bake. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until deep golden on top and crisp underneath. Lift a corner with a spatula to check the base has colour.
- Finish. Slide it out of the tin onto a rack straight away so the bottom stays crisp, and brush or drizzle with a last little olive oil while warm. Eat within a few hours for the best texture.
A few things that make the difference: use a properly good extra-virgin oil, because here it’s a headline flavour, not just a lubricant — if you’d like help choosing, see our olive oil guide. Don’t skimp on the oil in the tin either; it fries the base to a light crispness that’s half the pleasure of focaccia. And handle the risen dough gently — every big bubble you knock out is a bit of that airy crumb lost.
Olive focaccia — common questions
Should I use pitted or whole olives? Pitted is far kinder to your guests’ teeth and lets you press the olives flat into the dimples. If you only have whole olives, warn people there are stones, or pit them yourself first.
Can I make the dough ahead? Yes, and it’s better for it. A slow overnight rise in the fridge deepens the flavour and makes the wet dough much easier to handle cold. Bring it back to room temperature before the final shaping and rise.
Why is my focaccia dense rather than airy? Usually one of three things: the dough was too dry, it was under-proved, or it got knocked back too hard when shaping. Keep the dough properly wet, let it rise until genuinely puffy, and handle it gently in the tin.
What flour is best? Strong white bread flour, for the protein that holds a high-hydration dough together. Italian “00” flour gives a slightly softer, more tender result and many bakers love it for focaccia; plain all-purpose flour will still work, just with a little less spring.