Sicilian · Bread
Sfincione Palermitano
- Intermediate
- 45 min
- roughly 2 of 4 for cost
Leads with savory depth stacked from the pantry’s bass notes, a briny, maritime salinity, on a rich, rounded finish.
Ingredients
- 400g strong bread flour
- 100g semola rimacinata di grano duro
- 400ml water at 20C (68F)
- 7g fresh yeast
- 12g fine salt
- 30ml extra virgin olive oil
- 600g white onions, sliced thin
- 200g peeled plum tomatoes, crushed
- 8 salted anchovy fillets, rinsed
- 150g primosale or young caciocavallo, diced
- 60g coarse dry breadcrumbs
- 1 tbsp dried oregano
- 3 tbsp olive oil, for the topping
- salt and black pepper
Equipment
Sheet pan
The skills inside
Reducing a sauceFresh pastaSweating aromatics: soft, never brownedProofing: the rise before the ovenResting dough: the pause that does the work
The words inside
Allergen screen
Found: gluten · dairy · fish
Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.
Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.
Method
- Mix the flours with 350ml of the water and rest 30 minutes until no dry flour remains, then work in the yeast, salt, oil and the last of the water until the dough is slack, sticky and peels off the bowl in sheets. 30 min
- Fold it in the bowl four times at 30 minute intervals, until it holds a low dome, then refrigerate overnight. 30 min
- Cook the onions in the topping oil over low heat for 40 minutes until jammy, pale gold and sweet with no bite left, melt in the anchovies, then add the tomato and reduce until the mix mounds on the spoon. 40 min
- Press the dough into an oiled 30x40cm tray and prove 2 hours at room temperature, until it reaches the corners and a poked dent fills back only halfway. 120 min
- Scatter the cheese, lay the onion on in spoonfuls without pressing, then the breadcrumbs and oregano, and bake on the lowest shelf at 220C (430F) for 25 minutes, until the base is crisp when lifted with a palette knife and the crumb topping is dark gold. 25 min
How to tell it is going right
This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the techniques it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.
Resting dough: the pause that does the work 71 recipes
- It actually rested, covered, for the time stated, not cut short because the rest of the schedule was tight.
- It rolls and shapes without fighting: it stays where it is put, and it does not spring back or shrink on the bench between passes.
- The surface is smooth and supple rather than dry, cracked, or skinned over.
- It is at the temperature the next step needs: cold where the fat must stay solid, cool and relaxed where it must be rolled thin.
- Baked, it holds the dimensions it was shaped to rather than shrinking back from the edges of the tin or the rim of the dish.
Where it goes wrong The rest was skipped or shortened, so the gluten was still tight: the dough fought the pin and sprang back thick and uneven, then shrank down the sides of the tin in the oven.
Proofing: the rise before the oven 78 recipes
- Judged on volume against the container rather than on the clock: visibly grown, and grown by roughly the amount the recipe describes.
- The poke test agrees: a floured fingertip pressed a centimetre in leaves a dent that springs back slowly and only part of the way. Straight back means it is not ready; no spring at all means it has gone.
- The surface is domed, smooth, and slightly sheened: not cratered, wrinkled, or collapsed, and not skinned over and dry from proofing uncovered.
- Handled, it feels alive and airy: light for its size, with bubbles visible under the skin.
- It springs in the oven: the piece lifts in the first minutes and the scores open. A shape that does not move at all was proofed past its point before it went in.
Where it goes wrong It was proofed to the clock in a kitchen colder or warmer than the recipe assumed: overproofed, it collapses as the blade touches it and bakes flat and dense with a sour edge; underproofed, it tears at the side and bakes tight.
At the Table
- The Pour
- Fino or Manzanilla Sherry
- Also Right
- Muscadet or dry Riesling
- From the Taps
- Pilsner
- Zero-Proof
- Sparkling water with lemon
Salt-cured fish wants a bone-dry, saline partner: Sherry and Atlantic whites answer the cure without fighting it.
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