Bacon Focaccia is traditionally made during the Christmas holiday season, but bacon-lovers can enjoy this flakey, absolutely delicious recipe, any time. To have this to share with you, is very precious to me. If you love bacon, and you love authentic Italian food, you are going to love this.

Ingredients

6 cups all purpose flour + flour for dusting
1 and 1/2 teaspoons coarse, Kosher salt
1 cup water
1 packet dry active yeast (or 2 and 1/2 teaspoons)
1 teaspoon sugar
1 and 1/4 cup warm water set aside
1 pound bacon (about 12 pieces) pan fried until crisp, reserve the fat
extra virgin olive oil

Instructions

Place 6 cups of flour and the coarse salt in a large ceramic or glass bowl. Set aside.
Prepare the yeast.
First, use a container to heat one cup of water in the microwave for 35 seconds. Add the sugar and the packet of active dry yeast. Stir and cover with a clean dishtowel. Allow to activate in 10 minutes.
Heat 1 and 1/4 cups of water in the microwave for 40 seconds. Set it next to your bowl of flour.
Make a well in the center of your bowl of flour.After your yeast has been activated, pour it completely into the center of the flour-well.
Fold in the flour mixture. Add the one and 1/4 cup, one handful at a time until it’s completely incorporated. It will make a “snap” sound as you are kneading it, when it’s done.
Dust with flour at the bottom of the dough mound and then sprinkle more flour on the top.Cover and set in a warm area of your home.
Allow the dough to rise for one hour.
When you are ready to bake the focaccia, it is time to prepare the bacon. Cut the pound of bacon into very small pieces. Fry it all in a pan until completely crisp. Reserve all of the bacon grease. When you are ready to add it to the dough, the bacon fat should be cooled, but still a liquid.
Place the entire mound of risen dough into the pan you’ll use to bake the focaccia. (I used a deep, 10″ x 16″ pan.)Pour in the bacon grease and knead it into the dough, stretching and folding the dough to work it in.
Once most of the grease has been incorporated, add all of the crisp bacon pieces and the rest of the grease.
Continue to stretch and fold the dough until every inch if the dough feels like it has bacon pieces in it.
Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
The dough should be shaped to cover the pan.
Once it’s in place, allow the dough to rest in the pan for an additional 10 minutes, before placing it into the oven.
You will notice that it rises and plumps up a bit more.
Place in the oven and bake for 10 minutes.
Take it out of the oven and change your oven temperature to 500 degrees.
Drizzle the top of the half-baked focaccia with extra virgin olive oil and place back into the oven for 3-5 minutes, or until golden brown.

My Mom, AKA “Nonna” and I, would like to consider ourselves food historians. We love the traditions and recipes that have been passed down to us for our Italian roots. My mom was born and raised in, Italy. As for myself, being a first generation American on her side of the family, I want to hold onto all of the beautiful Italian culture that she has to share, so that my children and their children can continue in her footsteps.

The trick to getting detailed recipes from a woman who has been in the kitchen for 60 years, is to pay close attention, ask a lot of questions and stop her to measure whatever ingredients she pours into her hands, since she has no need for tools like measuring cups and spoons.

Today, we enjoyed making, “focaccia di fritteli.” This is slang for bacon pizza/focccia. This was made once a year, around Christmas time, when my grandmother would buy the annual pig to be butchered for her family of eight. With such a blessing, the family would make sausage, salami, prosciutto and other cured meats to be eaten throughout the upcoming year. This ‘pizza’ was part of the celebration, and made right away, with the fresh bacon.

I’m so happy to have finally documented this recipe after years of wanting to know more about this special occasion, Italian tradition.

Here’s what you’ll do:

Place 6 cups of flour and the coarse salt in a large ceramic or glass bowl. Set aside.

Prepare the yeast. First, use a container to heat one cup of water in the microwave for 35 seconds. Add the sugar and the packet of active dry yeast. Stir and cover with a clean dishtowel. Allow to activate in 10 minutes.

Heat 1 and 1/4 cups of water in the microwave for 40 seconds. Set it next to your bowl of flour.

Make a well in the center of your bowl of flour.

After your yeast has been activated, pour it completely into the center of the flour-well.

Fold in the flour mixture. Add the one and 1/4 cup, one handful at a time until it’s completely incorporated. It will make a “snap” sound as you are kneading it, when it’s done.

Dust with flour at the bottom of the dough mound and then sprinkle more flour on the top.

Cover and set in a warm area of your home. Allow the dough to rise for one hour.

When you are ready to bake the focaccia, it is time to prepare the bacon. Cut the pound of bacon into very small pieces. Fry it all in a pan until completely crisp. Reserve all of the bacon grease. When you are ready to add it to the dough, the bacon fat should be cooled, but still a liquid.

Place the entire mound of risen dough into the pan you’ll use to bake the focaccia. (I used a deep, 10″ x 16″ pan.)

Pour in the bacon grease and knead it into the dough, stretching and folding the dough to work it in. Once most of the grease has been incorporated, add all of the crisp bacon pieces and the rest of the grease. Continue to stretch and fold the dough until every inch if the dough feels like it has bacon pieces in it.

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

The dough should be shaped to cover the pan. Once it’s in place, allow the dough to rest in the pan for an additional 10 minutes, before placing it into the oven. You will notice that it rises and plumps up a bit more.

Place in the oven and bake for 10 minutes. Take it out of the oven and change your oven temperature to 500 degrees. Drizzle the top of the half-baked focaccia with extra virgin olive oil and place back into the oven for 3-5 minutes, or until golden brown.

I prefer to serve this as a warm appetizer or side dish, but you can store it in an airtight container for up to five days and enjoy a little each day.

For my friends who can appreciate some behind-the-scenes details of my wonderful life with my mom living with our family, I want to share the cultural/religious ritual for making dough that was passed down to my mother, and from generation to generation.

After the dough has been prepared, and before it is covered to rise, she does what has been taught to her: to make the sign of the cross with her hand, at top of the dough. This is like a little prayer for the small blessing of bread to come.

In Italy and long ago, people would bake their own bread to feed their family, so this gesture was/is not only thoughtful, but was necessary to their hearts, since without faith, they could only rely on their skill and the ingredients they had on-hand to work in their favor.

In this day and age, we are so blessed to be able to purchase anything we need, at any time we need it, but it is nice to know that we can make what we want with our own hands. I feel so thankful to have the capability to do so!

Buon Natale e Buon Anno!