Ingredient

Ciabatta

Ciabatta is defined by its crumb: large, irregular holes, a thin crisp crust and a chewy interior. That crumb comes from a very high hydration dough — often eighty per cent water to flour or more — handled as gently as possible. It is a wet, slack, sticky dough and learning to leave it alone is the entire skill.

Where the holes come from

Two things create an open crumb: a lot of water, and not knocking the gas out.

Water makes the dough extensible — able to stretch rather than snap — so the gas bubbles the yeast produces can expand into large irregular pockets instead of being held in a tight, even network. It also turns to steam in the oven, which pushes those pockets open further.

The gas has to survive being handled, which is why ciabatta is never kneaded conventionally after the first rise and never shaped in the way a tin loaf is. It is turned out, cut, and moved to the baking sheet with as little pressing as possible. Every squeeze collapses bubbles you cannot get back.

Most recipes also use a biga — a stiff pre-ferment of flour, water and a tiny amount of yeast left overnight. It develops flavour and acidity and strengthens the dough, which is what lets such a wet mixture hold its shape at all. Skipping it gives you a flatter, blander loaf.

The method

1. Make the biga the night before: flour, water and a pinch of yeast, mixed to a stiff dough, left at room temperature for twelve hours or so until bubbly and smelling of fermentation.
2. Mix the biga with the rest of the flour, water, yeast and salt. It will be a slack, sticky batter rather than a dough. This is correct.
3. Develop it with stretch and folds rather than kneading: with a wet hand, reach under one side, stretch it up and fold it over, turn the bowl and repeat. Four folds, every thirty minutes, over two hours. The dough transforms from soup to something that holds together.
4. Let it rise until at least doubled and full of visible bubbles.
5. Flour a work surface generously — more than feels right — and tip the dough out gently. Do not scrape or pull; let gravity do it.
6. Flour the top, and cut the dough into rectangles with a scraper or a knife. Cut, do not tear.
7. Move each piece to a floured tray or parchment, handling it from underneath and stretching it slightly into the characteristic slipper shape. Do not press it.
8. Prove for another thirty to forty-five minutes.
9. Bake in a very hot oven with steam — a tray of boiling water on the shelf below, or ice cubes thrown into a hot tray — for the first ten minutes. Steam keeps the crust soft long enough for the loaf to expand fully.
10. Bake until deep golden and hollow-sounding, and cool on a rack so the base does not go soggy.

Handling wet dough

The practical tricks, all of which make it much less alarming.

• Wet your hands, not the dough. Wet hands do not stick; floured hands do, once the flour absorbs.
• Use a dough scraper for everything. It is the right tool and hands are not.
• Flour the surface generously at the shaping stage, and accept that the flour on the outside is part of the look.
• Work quickly and decisively. Hesitant handling means more contact and more deflation.
• Do not add flour to fix the stickiness. The wetness is the recipe. Adding flour gives you a normal loaf.
• Use a container with straight sides for the bulk rise, so you can see how much it has risen.
• Cold-prove it if it is unmanageable. Chilled dough is much easier to handle and tastes better.

What ciabatta is for

It is a bread with a particular job, and it is a poor choice for some others.

Sandwiches

Its reason for existing. Ciabatta was created in Italy in the 1980s explicitly to compete with the French baguette for sandwich bread, and the open crumb holds oil and filling without going soggy.

Mopping up sauce

Excellent. The holes are the point.

Bruschetta and crostini

Very good — it toasts to a crisp shell with a chewy interior.

Toast for spreading

Poor. Butter and jam fall through the holes, which is the classic complaint about it.

Keeping

A day at best. High hydration and a thin crust mean it stales fast. It revives well in a hot oven and it makes excellent breadcrumbs and panzanella.

The name

Italian for "slipper", after the flat, irregular shape a piece of this dough falls into when it is handled as little as it should be.

Common questions