Easy Garlic & Sunflower Seeds Focaccia Bread

Soooo I love myself some good, airy and garlicy bread. Nothing better than this recipe for an easy garlic Focaccia Bread with nicely toasted and crunchy sunflower seeds on top. It just has everything I am looking for in some bread, fluffiness, some crispiness and the amazing garlicy oil drizzled on top. This bread is amazing to go with a nice soup or use it for a sandwich!

The possibilities are endless with this basic recipe, you can go anywhere with the toppings, go for nice and savoury or even sweet with some figs or plums. You can even make this into a amazing pizza focaccia with some tomatoes, tomato sauce, basil and cheese… I think I have to stop because explaining all the options is just making me hungry at the moment. So let’s stop talking and let’s get this focaccia going.

Ingredients

• 500 g | cups bread flour
• 350-400 ml lukewarm water
• 7 g | active dried yeast
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tbsp olive oil

for the toppings you will need:

• 4 tbsp olive oil
• 2-4 cloves of finely chopped garlic (use garlic to taste, I like mine super garlicy and go for 4 cloves)
• 1 tsp flake sea salt
• 3 tbsp sunflower seeds

Directions

• Yeast mix: get your lukewarm water and add the yeast to it, let it stand for about 8 minutes until it becomes frothy.
• In a large mixing bowl add the flour and the salt and give it a mix. Make a well in your flour mixture and slowly add in your yeast mixture and the olive oil. Mix until you have a slighly sticky dought (add water of it feels to dry and flour if it is super sticky)
• Sprinkle your work surface with some flour and knead your dough on it for 5-10 minutes.
• lightly oil a clean bowl with some olive oil and put your dough in it. let it rest for 1 hour with a damp tea towel on top. The dough should be doubled in size.
• Now oil a rectangle baking pan (25 x 35 cm / 10 x 14 inch) or line it with baking paper and dump your dough into it. Stretch the dough with your hands until it fills the tin. Let it rest for another 35-45 minutes.While your dough is resting, mix your chopped garlic with olive oil, so the flavour can nicely infuse. You can also preheat your oven now to 220°C  or 428°F.
• Press your fingers into the dough to form dimples and evenly sprinkly your garlic oil on top of it. Also distribute your sunflower seeds on top of your dough. Now bake 20 minutes until golden!
• Enjoy your focaccia warm or cold (warm is the way to go here)

Don’t forget to share when you are making this delicious and easy garlic focaccia recipe, or one of my other recipes like this garlicy naan bread.