Red Wine, Kalamata Olive and Feta
- Lex C
- Feb 10
- 4 min read
Updated: Feb 28
The Problem:
Kalamata olive bread is one of my favorites, but it can be a bit pricy. So I've been attempting to create a recipe with the same level of satisfaction as store bought.
My last attempt, using 1/4 cup of red wine and 1 cup water as hydration, came out flat. Ciabatta flat, not focaccia flat, but still hard to make a sandwich with. I also felt that red wine didn't add enough flavor or color to the final product.
And I have a lot of feta cheese lying around.
The Hypothesis:
Upping the red wine content to 1/2 cup with 3/4 cup water would give the wine more influence in the final loaf.
Adding the olives and cheese after the first rise would give the gluten more time to form and make a taller loaf.
Adding 1 cup of feta cheese after the first rise would give a richer flavor profile and reduce the amount of feta in my fridge.
The Experiment:
Materials:
1/2 cup fruity red wine
3/4 cup warm water
9.5 oz. jar of sliced Kalamata olives, drained
1 cup feta cheese
2 1/4 tsp. active dry yeast
1 tbsp. dark brown sugar
3 1/4 cups bread flower
1 1/2 tsp. fine kosher salt
2 tbsp. olive oil
1 cup boiling water
Procedure:
1) Add the wine to a sauce pan and bring to a light boil, reduce heat to simmer for 2 minutes to boil off the alcohol.
2) Transfer the wine to a container, stir in warm water, yeast and sugar. Let set for 10 minutes to proof the yeast. And proof it did.
3) Whisk flour and salt together in a mixing bowl.
4) Pour the wine/yeast mixture into the bowl and stir until combined in a shaggy mass.
Yeast still bubbling away.
Hard to tell, but the overall color is more ruddy.
5) Knead for 5 to 8 minutes until the dough is smooth.
6) Coat a bowl with the olive oil, and the dough and spin it around until lightly covered with oil.
7) Cover the bowl and let sit for an hour or until dough doubles in size.
8) Fold in the olives and cheese.
9) Put a piece of parchment paper on a baking sheet, put dough on paper and shape into a loaf.
10) Lightly cover in plastic wrap. Let rise for 30-45 minutes.
11) While that is going on, put and empty cast iron pan or other open container on the bottom shelf, preheat your oven to 450°, and boil some water.
12) Remove the plastic from the dough and put the baking sheet on the middle oven rack.
13) Quickly (and oh so carefully), pour the 1 cup boiling water into the pan on the lower rack and close the over. Yes, you will get a cloud of steam when you do this, that's the point.
14) Bake for 20 minutes to set the crust, remove the water pan, if necessary. Lower the oven temperature to 375°.
15) Bake for another 20 minutes, or until the interior temp of the bread is 200°.
16) Remove the bread from the oven, take remove the loaf from the paper and put on a cooling rack.
17) The hardest part. Let the bread cool completely (at least 45 minutes) before slicing.
Results:
The final loaf.
Thin, crispy crust.
And a wonderfully loose crumb.
Easy one first, I have significantly less feta cheese in my fridge, success!
The loaf is delicious, success!
The loaf is taller, success!
The crust is thin and crispy, the crumb is loose and moist, success!
The olives and cheese are not as fully integrated in to the loaf as I would have hoped. there are layers of flavors in the bread, which is interesting in itself, neither success or failure.
Overall result: Success!
Conclusions:
As I mentioned, I was not completely happy with the integration of olives and cheese. The folding process was messy and inaccurate. I believe that I should have introduced them into the flour mixture before adding the yeast and wine mixture.
As for how that sequence would have affected the height of the final product, well, I have another theory about that. As I was folding in the olives and cheese, it felt to me that the hydration of the dough was changing. So much so that I modified my baking process to more of the high hydration model. That is, higher initial temp and steam initially, then lower heat and no steam. The folding process also became more of a second knead.
I believe that adding the mix-ins early, combined with more manipulation after the first rise would give the same height of the loaf. But that's an experiment for another time.
Happy breading!
-- Lex
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