Loafing – on the Italian job

Now if there’s one thing my gals have always liked – even before they were able to stand erect without nosediving - it’s olives. Kalamatas, green ones, stuffed ones, pitted ones, big ones, little ones. And the bigger the jar the better.

The fact their Mum’s got Italian blood flowing through her veins - not too far from the surface - may have something to do with it (doesn’t explain my predilection to the savoury buggers, though).

So, when I suggested I’d knock out an olive loaf over the weekend, I was almost bowled over in the rush!

I must say for a first effort, she wasn’t a half-bad 750gm loaf!

So here goes . . . You’ll need the following:

* 310 mls of tepid tap water

* 2 tspns of virgin olive oil

* 1 3/4 tpns of salt

* 450 gms of plain flour

* 1 tspn of bread improver

* ¼ cup of grated mozzarella cheese

* 2 tbspns of pitted and sliced kalamata olives

* 3 tspns of pesto paste (not too dry)

* 1 ¼ tspn of dry yeast

I added all the ingredients except the olives immediately to the water and oil in Bev’s baking pan, then set her on the French cycle for a medium crust.

Although tempted, I held off adding the olives until I heard Bev’s add-stuff beeps, eight minutes into the kneading process.

Anyway, cutting to the chase, the end result was delicious. The gals thought it was soft and not-at-all-dry as some Italian breads can tend to be. I put this down to the olive oil, the oil in the pesto and residual oil in the olives.

The crown sagged just a tad, and I put that down to a little too much salt; next time I’ll try just 1 ½ tspns of salt, and allow the saltiness of the kalamatas do the rest.

If you have any meat-etarians in the house, you can add 2 tbspns of finely chopped pepperoni – but again, I’d be thinking of cranking back the salt. Or if yours is a full-on veggie mob, substitute 1 tbspn of finely chopped sundried tomatoes for the sausage.

All in all, not a shabby effort . . . and she tasted even better the following morning for breakfast!