Preparation time: 1 hour and 30 minutes + 20-25 minutes cooking time
Ingredients for 10 servings
all-purpose flour 4 cups (500 g)
water 1 cup (250 ml)
brewer’s yeast 1/2 oz (15 g)
salt 1 1/2 tsp (10 g)
sugar 3 1/2 tsp (15 g)
pitted green olives, roughly chopped
3 1⁄2 oz (100 g) about 23 large
extra-virgin olive oil 3 tbsp + 2 tsp (50 ml)
Method
Mix the flour, water, oil and yeast. Dissolve the salt in a few drops of water and add it to the mix. Knead the dough for a few minutes, then add the olives (roughly chopped). Cover the dough with a cloth and let it rise in a warm place for 20 minutes. Divide it into pieces of equal size and shape them into breadsticks (you should get about 10). Arrange in a pan lined with parchment paper and let rise in a warm place until they’ve doubled in size. Bake a preheated oven at 400° F (200° C) until golden brown and crispy, about 20-25 minutes, depending on the size of the breadsticks.
A thousand types of bread
If Italy is the country of “a hundred cities” and “a thousand bell towers,” then there are even more traditional breads to be enjoyed. This food, simultaneously simple and complex, has historically taken on many forms. Though it remains universally recognizable as “bread,” it always manifests itself in different flavors with different features. Depending on the socio-economic conditions of where it is produced, the ritual meaning connected to it, and the intended culinary use, bread can be large or small, white or black, tapered, ring-shaped, braided, or an infinite number of other shapes. The creativity of the Italian people has resulted in many different forms of bread, from the basic loaf (whose semispherical shape seems to fit the curve of your hands) to longer shapes (probably a nod to pagan fertility symbols), to the ring shape that recalls a sun disk. Bread still plays a cultural, magical, recreational, and convivial role that is unparalleled.
