Focaccia Caprese

New year brings new beginnings they say and mine will be to blog regularly about the recipes I try out in the kitchen regularly. I am kinda de cluttering my life and putting blogging high up on my priority list :) so those of my friends who have been asking me when the next post is coming up. Here it is. I have joined a fabulous bread baking group started by Aparna that's called We Knead to Bake. She gives out a tested and a fabulous recipe every month and we need to bake along. There is nothing like a gang of virtual bakers egging you on to try bread recipes and they are so helpful in sharing tips and tricks and the finer nuances of bread baking. I love baking breads and think that breads for snacks are definitely a healthier option. I haven't tried out very complicated ones like croissants yet but have come a long way since my first foray some 2 years back. More about the recipe now....There are loads of variations in focaccia like plain, herbed, topped etc and this is the first time I am trying a recipe that has a lot of toppings along with a flavoured oil drizzle. I think that's the secret of keeping this bread moist and bursting with flavour. The original recipe can be found here: http://www.mydiversekitchen.com/2014/01/we-knead-to-bake-13-focaccia-caprese.html I did not make any changes to the recipe. Just added some black olives to the other topping ingredients. Fresh Mozzarella definitely makes this bread special. Do try to bake with this cheese but ensure that the cheese is well drained else the top becomes soggy. So without rambling on any further, here is my version of the Focaccia Caperese.

The bread is light and moist. Its best consumed immediately after baking. The bread was being baked in the oven when my daughter came back home from school. One sniff and she guessed that a 'yummy bread' was being baked :) Note: I use my KitchenAid stand mixer to knead the dough but you should be able to achive good results by hand too. If you are using KA then it takes just about 7-8 minutes for mixing and kneading the dough. Substitute with mozzarella if you cannot find the fresh one. You need about 1/2 cup of oil for the entire recipe (1/4 cup of flavoured oil and 1/4 cup plain) but what I did was used herbs and seasoning to the half cup of oil to OD the flavour. Try it and let me know if it worked for you too...