Delicious Loaded Baked Potato Focaccia Bread Recipe

Jump to Recipe

This delicious Loaded Baked Potato Focaccia is a crowd favorite at our bakery, The Flour Barn. The tang from the cream cheese-sour cream topping pairs so perfectly with the savory, crispy bacon and fresh scallions. Focaccia is such a simple, yet impressive bread to make. This spin on the classic Italian bread is the perfect appetizer for your next tailgate or dinner party or even a weeknight treat that can stand on its own.

Worried You’re Not a Bread Baker?

Focaccia is SO EASY! Not a bread baker? Or avid cook? Kitchen Lover? This is the easiest recipe for first time bakers. Everyone loves a delicious and flavorful bread, and they’re going to love this decadent focaccia. This recipe is so simple with minimal hands-on time. The only skill you really need to make focaccia is patience. Now, like any yeast recipe, it takes time to rise and mature, and this particular recipe relies on slow fermentation to develop a beautiful depth of flavor and texture.

Mixing Focaccia Dough

To make the dough for your homemade focaccia bread, we’re going to start by placing your dry ingredients in a large bowl. Mix your dry ingredients together and make a well in the center. To this we add the room temperature water (or warm water) and olive oil and mix together with a Danish whisk or your fingers until you no longer see dry flour bits. You’ll notice that a very shaggy dough forms, and it may not form into a dough ball but that’s okay. Continue to stir your sticky dough with your danish whisk, dough hook on a mixer, or your hands for a couple of minutes. Next, let the dough rest for 30 minutes.

This period of rest gives the flour time to fully absorb the water before you begin working it. Gluten is only able to form when flour absorbs water. Giving the bread flour a chance to fully hydrate will allow for better gluten development. After the thirty minutes is up, you will begin to strengthen the focaccia dough by stretching and folding it.

How to Stretch and Fold Focaccia Dough

Focaccia dough is a very wet dough and can be a little tricky to work with. Because of this, we are not going to knead the dough as you might be used to. We are going to develop the gluten through a series of stretch and folds. Stretching and folding bread dough is a gentle way of developing a good gluten structure that doesn’t require any kneading.  

Place your Focaccia Dough on the pan it will bake in.

Your delicious focaccia is going to bake on either a cookie sheet pan, square pan or a 9×13 baking dish,, or cast iron skillet. Whichever you use, go ahead and oil your pan with olive oil and dump the dough out onto the baking sheet. Next, place a little bit of extra virgin olive oil on your hands so they won’t stick, and pat your dough gently into a rough rectangle. Look at your dough and see that it has four sides. Beginning at the side farthest from you, pinch the back two corners and lift the dough up away from the pan.

At this point, your dough has very little gluten development and it should be very stretchy. Raise the dough about a foot in the air, the bottom portion of the dough should not lift off the pan. Fold the dough over two thirds of itself, as if you were folding a letter, and press the corners down to seal. Now take the bottom two corners of your rectangle and lift up, stretching the dough about a foot. Fold the dough backwards over two thirds of the dough, sealing the corners by pressing them down into the dough.

Stretching and folding is SO much easier than kneading!

Repeat this process from left to right, starting with the two left corners and stretching and folding to the right. After finishing with the right side, you should have a nice, smaller, chubbier rectangle. Lift the dough and flip it over so that all seams are on the bottom. Spread some more olive oil on the surface of the dough and cover the pan with plastic wrap. Allow the dough to rest for 30 minutes.

After thirty minutes, repeat the stretch and fold process. The dough will have puffed up and spread out a bit as it begins to rise and form air bubbles. The great thing about stretching and folding the dough is that you are developing the gluten without getting rid of those nice air bubbles you’re creating. As you perform the second round of stretching and folding, you’ll notice the dough is a little tighter. It does not stretch as far, and the dough is a little smoother. Place dough with the seams down, cover with plastic wrap, and allow to rest for one hour in a warm spot.

Dimpling the Focaccia Dough

The trademark of Focaccia is the dimpled surface of the dough. This dimpling creates a light and airy bread and a perfect foundation for pizza toppings! After allowing it to rest for thirty minutes to one hour, your dough will have risen and puffed up nicely. Next, remove the plastic wrap and oil your fingers with a tablespoon of olive oil so they do not stick to your dough. Working from the center out, begin pressing all fingers into the dough, pressing down and out to spread the dough out towards the four corners of the pan. Your fingers should press down towards the bottom of the pan but should not break through the dough. Then, continue dimpling until the dough covers at least three quarters of the pan.

Overnight Fermentation

Time is critical to good focaccia bread, and overnight fermentation is the best way to develop a full flavored, perfectly textured focaccia. After dimpling the sweet focaccia bread dough, cover the pan with plastic wrap and place it in the refrigerator overnight and wake up to it the next day. It can stay in the fridge for up to five days. While the waiting may seem like an inconvenience, once you embrace the slow process of this recipe, it can actually become a wonderful way to have an amazing weekend dinner made ahead and ready to go! When Friday comes around, I pull my focaccia dough out of the fridge two to three hours before I want to bake it. At this point the elastic dough rises prior to going in the oven. Now I have a quick meal that everyone loves!

Loading Your Baked Potato Focaccia

Prep Your Potatoes

Thinly slice you potatoes and toss them in olive oil. This will help them to get golden brown while baking, and not charred. 

Prep your bacon

Fry up some slices of bacon and then once cool, crumble up for the top of your focaccia.  

Prep your Sour cream Topping

Combine your room temperature cream cheese with your sour cream. Either use a stand mixer and mix on medium speed till smooth or mix by hand. If mixing by hand I would suggest softening your cream cheese in the microwave for 30 seconds.

Prep your Shredded Cheese

Freshly grate a block of cheddar cheese. Pre-shredded cheese does not melt as well. 

Prep your Focaccia

After your focaccia has been out of the fridge for two to three hours, you now want to cover it in olive oil and use your fingertips to dimple the top of your dough.  As you press your fingers into the dough, use your hands to stretch your dough to cover your whole pan. 

Topping Your Focaccia

Part One

Once your Focaccia has been dimpled cover in kosher salt. Take a spoon and dollop on your sour cream topping. You will not spread it over the whole focaccia, but instead place evenly spaced dollops on the top of the dough. Then lay a single layer of your potato slices over the whole top of your focaccia. Sprinkle again with coarse salt and put in the oven at 450 for 8-10 minutes or until it reaches an internal temperature of 190 F.

Part Two

Remove the focaccia from the oven when it reaches an internal temperture of 190 F or when the potatoes are looking golden brown and slightly crispy. Place on cooling rack and quickly cover the whole top in shredded cheddar cheese. Put back in the oven for 3-5 more minutes or until the focaccia reaches an internal temp of 200 F.

Finishing touches:

Remove your focaccia from the oven and top with crispy bacon bits and slices of spring onions or chives. 

Enjoy Your Loaded Baked Potato Focaccia

Each week we all watch the bakery case, hoping that some of the Loaded Baked Potato Focaccia will be left over from the day. Rarely does it happen, but when it does we are all fighting over those last few pieces. Be sure to try this recipe, but make sure you make enough for everyone.

Print Recipe