Ciabatta - An Italian Bread

In Italy, cibatta means slipper which leads many people to call this bread as slipper bread..Ciabatta bread was invented by Italian bread bakers and become very popular throughout the rest of the world, this bread have a very distinct flavor and its very versatile bread to enjoy with anything from appetizier to sandwich..I love ciabatta bread and we buy it for our sandwich, before starting making this ciabatta bread at home i went through my baking books..Finally i got hooked with a simple oval shaped ciabatta bread and immediately i prepared them, i was really nervous about the dough as they got stuck with all over my finger and had a great time to shape it...Once baked this bread was excellent, i can say that its really worth to try out this beautiful bread at home..



3cups White strong flour (i used the white bread flour)
2tsp Active dry yeast
1tsp Sugar

1tbsp Salt
3tbsp Olive oil
Salt
Extra flour to sprinkle

Take the yeast, sugar in a cup of luke warm water in a small bowl and stir well...Leave in a warm place until th e yeast mixture turns foamy..Take 2 cups of flour and salt in a bowl, make a well in the centre and add the frothy yeast mixture, olive oil, stir everything well with a wooden spatule, this dough will be extremely sticky and it will be quite wet at this stage, shape the dough and place in a clean bowl, cover the bowl with a damp tea towel and leave in warm place for 4 hours..

Stir in the remaining cup of flour and mix well the flour to the doubled dough, scrape the side of the bowl, cover with plastic wrap and place in warm place for an hour..Springle a large baking tray with flour, dont punch the dough but carefully arrange them over the floured baking tray, make a oval dough, springle again the flour over the dough, cover with a plastic wrap and leave for 30 minutes aside..

Preheat the oven to 210C, place a container full of ice water on the base of the oven, bake the ciabatta for 30minutes,until the crust turns golden brown,dont forget to remove the water container after about 20minutes, the loaf cooked sounds halllow when tapped, ur ciabatta is ready to enjoy..