Quick Greek olive yeast bread recipe

This bread takes about 90 minutes from start to out of the oven with another 15-30 minutes to cool.

You can mix and knead this with a heavy duty mixer or by hand. I've done it both ways, and it seems to be easier over all to do this by hand, especially if you consider clean up. It's a very wet dough, so mixing by hand isn't that difficult.


Ingredients:

3 3/4 (1 1/2 + 2 1/4) cups (200g + 305g) of bread (or all-purpose) flour
1 1/2 cups of lukewarm water
1 packet (1/4 oz) of dry yeast (~2 teaspoons)
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 teaspoon of salt

~1/2 cup Kalamata olives coarsely chopped
~2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary

Preparation:

Dissolve yeast in the warm water.

In a mixing bowl, combine 1 1/2 cups (200 g) of flour, salt, oil, and yeast with water, and mix until thoroughly blended. Cover tightly and let sit for 30 minutes.

Add the olives and rosemary.


If kneading with a mixer:

Mixing with dough hook, slowly add 2 cups (275 g) of flour to the yeast mixture and knead until smooth. The dough will be very sticky and just needs enough additional flour so it can be handled. 

Sprinkle a work surface with the remaining 1/4 cup (~30 g) of flour and turn out the dough, kneading briefly by hand, pulling in the flour, until it doesn't stick to hands.

To knead by hand:

Add 1 1/2 cups (200 g) of flour to the yeast mixture and combine with hands to form a cohesive dough. Turn out onto a floured work surface and knead in as much of the remaining flour as needed until the dough is smooth and doesn't stick to hands.

Shape into two loaves, place on a nonstick baking sheet leaving space between for the dough to rise. You can slash the top of the loaves 2-3 times if you like, I don't bother. Place on the middle rack in a cold oven for 15 minutes.

Turn on oven to 425°F (220°C) and bake on the middle rack for 30 minutes (40 in my oven) or until golden.

Based on Psomi Spitiko: http://greekfood.about.com/od/greekbreadspitas/r/aspro_psomi.htm

I found the original recipe a bit bland but thought it could be a good base for herb breads. It works very well for that. I added olives and rosemary with great results.