Savory focaccia is a deliciously beautiful introduction to gluten-free bread baking.
Featuring a salty herb topping of rosemary and kalamata olives, this Italian flatbread can be easily modified with your favorite herbs and vegetables to suit your taste!
How I missed eating focaccia in the decades pre-celiac diagnosis confounds me! Fortunately, I have an in-house expert (aka my wife) who eats gluten sometimes and had the pleasure of eating authentic focaccia - in Italy! She tasted every test I cranked out of the kitchen and confirmed that this one (test #8) is, “that good!”
This year is my 10th year of eating gluten-free. Blogs including this one, played no small part in my healing journey. I’ve been able to continue celebrating birthdays with cake and experience tasty new foods and flavors.
Audrey mentioned to me a little while back that there have been reader requests for a good gluten-free focaccia recipe and so I met and fell in love with focaccia. Perhaps you will too.
Before diving into this recipe and bread making in general, there are 2 pieces of equipment I highly recommend having on hand:
- Kitchen Scale
When measuring flours, I find more consistency in my baking when measuring by weight (grams) instead volume (cups). - Kitchen Thermometer (Digital Instant-Read)
This comes in handy for making sure the water is *just* warm enough to activate the yeast, but not hot enough to kill it. In this case, we're looking for 120°-130°F because the yeast is mixed right into the flours.
A Quick Note on Scaling:
This bread is best the day of baking, so we recommend scaling the recipe based on the number of people being fed.
- As is, this recipe uses an 8” square baking pan and yields 4 servings of 4” focaccia squares.
- For 2 servings, cut the recipe in half and bake in a 6" round cake pan (a springform does nicely).
- For 8 servings, double the recipe and bake in a 9x13 Pyrex baking dish.
Olive Rosemary Focaccia
Savory focaccia is a deliciously beautiful introduction to gluten-free bread baking. Featuring a salty herb topping of rosemary and kalamata olives, this Italian flatbread can be easily modified with your favorite herbs and vegetables to suit your taste!
- Prep Time: 15 min
- Proof Time: 2 hr
- Cook Time: 22 min
- Total Time: 2 hr 37 min
- Yield: 4 servings
- Category: Savory
- Method: baked
- Cuisine: vegan
- Diet: Gluten Free
Ingredients
Dry:
- ½ c (80 g) white rice flour
- ½ c (70 g) sorghum flour
- 8 tsp (20 g) tapioca starch
- 2 Tbsp (24 g) potato starch
- 1 ½ tsp (5 g) active dry yeast
- 1 ½ tsp coconut sugar
- ½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp salt
Wet:
- 2 Tbsp olive oil, divided
- 1 c water (120°-130°F), divided
Toppings*:
- 14 pitted kalamata olives
- 1 sprig fresh rosemary
- ½ tsp Maldon salt
Instructions
Prepare an 8" square baking pan by lightly greasing with oil and lining with parchment paper.
Whisk together dry ingredients in a mixing bowl and drizzle 1 tablespoon of the olive oil on top.
Add ¾ cup of the warm water to the dry mix and stir with a large spoon or spatula. Important: Add just enough extra water to make the dough the consistency of pancake batter. The amount needed will depend on the humidity in your environment.
Pour the batter into the parchment lined pan and cover with a damp kitchen towel. Allow to proof/rise for 90 minutes in a warm spot (in the oven with no heat and the light on is perfect) to roughly double in volume and have an uneven surface from the active yeast bubbles.
Preheat oven to 450° F. While the oven heats up, gently add toppings to delicate dough surface.
- Drain and pat olives dry with a paper towel. Space olives evenly over dough.
- Decorate with rosemary leaves.
- Drizzle or dab remaining tablespoon of olive oil with pastry brush onto surface of dough.
- Finally, sprinkle Maldon salt over top of dough.
Bake for 22 minutes, until bread is golden and dry to the touch. Use parchment to lift focaccia onto baking rack and allow to cool 15 minutes before cutting and serving.
Best eaten right away!**
Notes
*Toppings can easily be changed to suit your tastes! Ideas: sun-dried tomatoes, roasted garlic, this yummy pesto, fresh herbs, dried herbs, lemon slices, red onion (raw or caramelized), grapes, vegan parmesan, roasted mushrooms - the possibilities are endless!
**Focaccia is best eaten the day it's made, so it's recommended to size the recipe to the number of servings you will consume day of baking. Otherwise, freeze leftovers in an airtight container and reheat on a baking sheet in the oven at 300°.
- This recipe uses an 8” square baking pan and yields 4 servings of 4” focaccia squares.
- For 2 servings, cut the recipe in half and bake in a 6" round cake pan (a springform does nicely).
- For 8 servings, double the recipe and bake in a 9x13 Pyrex baking dish.
Keywords: vegan focaccia, gluten-free focaccia, gluten-free vegan focaccia, vegan gluten-free focaccia, gf vegan focaccia, rosemary olive gluten-free focaccia, gluten-free vegan flatbread
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