Super Easy Rustic Sicilian Quick Bread

Today I was on break at home and thought it would be a great day to make my Grandma's fresh olive rosemary bread. I started to round up the ingredients but suddenly realised I had no olives!!! So I started thinking "I wonder if I could make something else instead." Well here it is, my homemade quick bread that I kinda just made up as I went along. Weird how that works, right? It's just basically a white quick bread with some olive oil in it and some olive oil and rosemary on top, but it's divine! So let's get started!

Let's get your ingredients together, shall we?

1 1/4 cups white bread flour plus extra for dusting the baking sheet and for the kneading process

1 tsp active dry or fast rise yeast

1 tbsp olive oil, plus extra for the top

3/4 + 1/8 cup sparkling water (or 200 ml) You could probably squeeze by with 3/4 as the dough is quite sticky

1/2 tsp salt

Dried or fresh rosemary for topping

Utensils you say?

Small/medium mixing bowl

Spoon/other stirring device

Hands (one will suffice but two is preferred)

A fire box, or in the words of your people "oven"

Baking sheet

Sharp knife or kitchen scissors

And a timing machine (timer)

Preheat your oven to 425°F and let it do its thing.

Put the flour, salt, and yeast together in a bowl. Add the oil and sparkling water and stir until the dough forms a really sticky ball. You'll just know when its time to knead.

Flour your counter pretty decently as the dough will be quite sticky until you really start working it. Work it for about 10 minutes until the dough becomes a nice ball. You'll have to sprinkle flour on the dough from time to time to keep it from sticking. The dough needs the flour to dry out. Flatten it into a disk about 1 1/2 inches thick and use your kitchen scissors or knife to cut some slits in the top for ventilation. I chose to do an "X". Sprinkle your baking sheet with some flour and place the loaf on it.

Bake in the oven for about 25 minutes. You don't want a brown crust. If you see a brown crust, you've cooked it too long :( You should be able to flick the bottom and get a hollow sound.

Let the bread cool for about 10 minutes then brush the top with olive oil and sprinkle with dried rosemary. You can mix rosemary, olive oil, and garlic powder to get a great dipping oil for your new quick bread. Enjoy the fruits of your labor :) It doesn't get much easier than this.