Focaccia Semplice Fatta in Casa (Italian Homemade Focaccia) Italian Homemade Focaccia Focaccia Semplice Fatta in Casa Focaccia Semplice Fatta in Casa (Italian Homemade Focaccia) Focaccia is one of the clearest demonstrations of what makes Italian bread culture extraordinary. Flour, water, yeast, salt and extra virgin olive oil are transformed through fermentation, hydration and heat into a bread with a deeply golden exterior, crisp base and exceptionally tender interior. A gr

Rome Why Italians Shape Global Taste but Struggle to Help Each Other Italy is a paradox. Few countries have contributed so much to global culture — in art, music, food, fashion, and design — and yet few seem so unable to turn this cultural capital into collective power. Italians abroad are everywhere: running restaurants in Buenos Aires, designing skyscrapers in New York, leading fashion houses in Paris, scoring films in Hollywood. The world embraces Italian style. But ask It

Bread Making Walk into an Italian bakery, pizzeria, or pasta laboratory and the word flour immediately becomes more complicated than it appears. All-purpose flour, bread flour, Italian “00,” durum flour, semolina, semola rimacinata—these products may all begin with wheat, but they do not behave the same way. Changing the flour changes hydration, gluten development, extensibility, fermentation, crust, crumb, color, flavor, and ultimately the character of the finished product.