Focaccia Romana · Pizza Bianca Romana
Lazio · street · serves 8 · 240 min total · medium
The Roman cousin of focaccia: a long flat slab, oil and coarse salt on top, nothing else. Sold by weight at every bakery counter in the city, cut to length with scissors, and split horizontally to stuff with mortadella or prosciutto — the canonical Roman snack. Stripped-back, oil-rich, bake-hot.
Ingredients
- 500 g strong bread flour
- 400 ml warm water
- 50 ml extra-virgin olive oil + more for the tin and top
- 5 g fresh yeast
- 10 g fine sea salt
- 1 tsp coarse sea salt for top
Method
- Dissolve the yeast in the water. Combine with the flour, salt, and 25 ml of the olive oil. Mix with a wet hand until shaggy — 2 minutes. Cover and rest 30 min.
- Stretch-and-fold in the bowl (pull each side up and over the centre, rotating the bowl). Cover, rest 30 min. Repeat four times in total — two hours of folds.
- Cover the bowl well and refrigerate 12–18 hours. This long cold proof is where the flavour and open crumb come from.
- Oil a 30×40 cm tray generously with the remaining olive oil. Tip the dough out without punching it down. Stretch gently to fit, edge to edge.
- Cover loosely. Second rise 2 hours at room temperature, until very pillowy.
- Heat the oven to 250°C (480°F), lower-middle rack. Romana wants it hotter than Genovese — a fast, sharp bake.
- Oil your fingertips. Dimple thoroughly to the bottom of the tin, every 3–4 cm.
- Drizzle 2 more tbsp olive oil across the surface and into the dimples. Scatter the coarse salt. No brine, no rosemary, no toppings — Rome keeps it bare.
- Bake 15–18 min, until the top is mottled dark gold and the bottom is properly crisp.
- Lift onto a rack immediately — leaving it in the tin steams the base soft. Cool 10 min, cut into long rectangles with scissors. Eat warm, plain — or slice horizontally and stuff with mortadella for the canonical Roman snack.