No Knead Focaccia with a Roasted Red Pepper, Feta and Walnut Dipping Sauce

You know when you see a recipe and you think – this can’t be right – this is too easy, something must be missing.  Well this is one of those recipes.  But nothing’s missing and it’s the easiest no knead focaccia recipe around.  Just 3 main ingredients and some water.  No proofing the yeast, no second rise time, no preheating a pan in the oven.  Just mix it up, leave it on the counter overnight, plop it in the oven in the morning and you’ve got a delicious, chewy focaccia with a golden brown crust.

I loved how easy this was to make.  It takes  5 minutes to measure and combine the main ingredients. Then just cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave it on the counter overnight.  You can leave it for 12 to 18 hours – whatever works best for you.  The first time I mixed the ingredients at 8pm and baked it at 8am. The second time, mixed it up at 8pm and baked it around noon the next day.  Both times it came out great.

Focaccia comes in many forms – sometimes soft and flaky, sometimes oily and sometimes dense and chewy.  This is the dense and chewy kind.  It’s not a very flat focaccia – it’s thicker and more bread like.  The thickness is an extra bonus, since you could slice it in half to make a sandwich if you have any left over.

I was going to serve it with a swirl of olive oil and balsamic vinegar but it didn’t seem right – it felt like it needed something more substantial. So I decided to make a roasted red pepper, feta and walnut dipping sauce.  The dip has an intense flavor with the bite of the red peppers, saltiness of the feta and just a hint of crunch from the walnuts.   Just throw all the ingredients in the food processor and you’re done.

A couple of notes:

I want to stress that this is not a flaky, oily, pastry like focaccia.  It’s a dense, chewy, yummy, bread like focaccia.

After the dough has risen, it is extremely sticky.  I tried to poke holes in the top of the dough to give it a dimpled top – but the holes just filled back in.  It was tough to get the dough to spread out in the pan since it was so sticky.  Try and spread it out the best you can – I used an oiled spatula to help stretch it in to the corners of the pan.

I topped my focaccia with sea salt and rosemary – a simple and classic topping for focaccia.  Caramelized onions, olives or sun dried tomatoes would all be great toppings as well.

Traditional focaccia usually has a lot of olive oil but I didn’t add very much oil at all.  If you want to add more olive oil just drizzle it on the top of the dough before baking.

If you have any of the dipping sauce left over – it makes a great sandwich spread.

No Knead Focaccia with a Roasted Red Pepper, Feta and Walnut Dipping Sauce

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No knead focaccia – dense and chewy and delicious. The roasted red pepper, feta and walnut dipping sauce is an added bonus. Both are extremely easy to make and eat!

• Prep Time: 15 mins
• Cook Time: 35 mins
• Total Time: 50 minutes
• Yield: 6 to 8 1x

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

• No Knead Focaccia:
• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 1 3/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp yeast – I used Fleischmann’s Active Dry Yeast
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 2 tbs olive oil
• 2 tbs chopped rosemary
• Sea Salt to taste
• Roasted Red Pepper, Feta and Walnut Dipping Sauce:
• 1 12 ounce jar of roasted red peppers.
• 1/2 cup of feta cheese
• 1 large handful of walnuts
• 1 tbs olive oil
• 1 tbs lemon
• 1 clove garlic
• Pepper to taste

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Instructions

1. For Focaccia:
2. Put flour, salt and yeast in a bowl and gently stir to combine. Add water (water does not need to be warm) and stir until all the flour is mixed with the water – don’t over mix it. Will be a very wet dough. Cover with plastic wrap and leave on the counter overnight from 12 to 18 hours. Dough should double in size overnight.
3. After 12 to 18 hours – Preheat the oven to 425.
4. Pour 2 tbs olive oil in to a 9×9 nonstick pan. Turn dough (using a spatula to carefully scrape it out of the bowl) in to a pan. It will be a very wet and sticky dough. Try and spread it out as best you can – but it’s not important for it to fill the whole pan. It will expand when it’s baking. I let it sit for 10 minutes before baking but if you’re rushed just put it straight in the oven.
5. Chop up whatever you like to sprinkle on top – olives, rosemary, salt, etc.. and sprinkle on top before you put it in the oven.
6. Turn down oven to 400 degrees and put the focaccia in the oven to bake. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack.
7. For Roasted Red Pepper, Feta and Walnut Dipping Sauce:
8. Put all ingredients in a food processor and pulse until smooth.