Scaccia

Dough rolled transparently thin and folded over its filling four times.

Not vegetarian — contains caciocavallo whose rennet the source does not name.

Ingredients

• 500 g fine semolina flour
• 280 ml warm water
• 40 ml olive oil
• 10 g salt
• 5 g fresh yeast
• 500 g tomato passata, cooked down thick
• 250 g caciocavallo, grated
• 1 onion, sliced thinly
• basil
• black pepper

Method

1. Make a firm semolina dough and knead it 15 minutes. Rest it 90 minutes — this dough has to be stretched further than any other in the collection and it needs the relaxation.
2. ROLL IT UNTIL YOU CAN READ THROUGH IT, a rectangle about 50 by 35 cm. Thinner than pasta. If it tears, patch it and carry on.
3. Spread thickened tomato over the whole sheet, leaving a border, and scatter cheese, onion, basil and pepper.
4. NOW FOLD IT IN FROM BOTH LONG SIDES TO MEET IN THE MIDDLE, spread more filling on top of the folds, and FOLD AGAIN the same way. Four layers of pastry and three of filling, in a long loaf.
5. The folding is the dish. Rolled as a single-layer pie it is a focaccia with tomato on it; the point is the alternating thin layers you see on the cut face.
6. Tuck the ends under, brush with oil, and prick the top.
7. Bake at 200C for 40 minutes. Cool 20 minutes before cutting across, so the layers show.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Italy · All recipes