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Cretan Bread

This Cretan (or Cretan-style) bread has a soft dough, enriched with olive oil, preserved tomatoes, green olives and cooked onions.

69K 24 4.1

Last modified on: October 24^th 2017

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For 8 pieces, you will need:

1 150 g green olives
2 150 g onion
3 2 tablespoons olive oil
4 150 g feta
5 150 g Preserved tomatoes
6 1 kg plain white flour (French Type 65)
7 650 ml water
8 18 g fine (or table) salt
9 15 g yeast
10 100 g leaven (optional)
11 50 g olive oil
12 1 tablespoon dry oregano
Total weight: 2,378 grams

Change these quantities to make: 4 pieces 8 pieces 16 pieces 24 pieces

Change measures: Metric

Metric weight Metric volumes

How long does it take?

Time required for this recipe:

Preparation	Resting	Cooking	Start to finish
38 min.	3 hours 20 min.	28 min.	4 hours 26 min.

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Step by step recipe

Stage 1 - 3 min.

Prepare the filling

Roughly chop 150 g green olives.

Stage 2 - 5 min.

Prepare 150 g onion and slice into thin rings.

Stage 3 - 3 min.

Pour 2 tablespoons olive oil into a saucepan on medium heat. Add the onions, salt and pepper, then mix well.

Cook uncovered without colouring for 2 or 3 minutes.

Stage 4 - 1 min.

Add the onions, 150 g feta and 150 g Preserved tomatoes to the olives...

Stage 5 - 1 min.

...then mix all this together.

Stage 6

In bread-making, the water temperature is always important. It's not a fixed value, but related to 3 other temperatures: 1) the temperature of your flour, 2) the room temperature in your kitchen, and 3) the basic temperature of this recipe, which is 56-60°C.

You can calculate the temperature of the water for this recipe in one click, using this small calculator.

Stage 7 - 5 min.

Put into a food processer bowl: 1 kg plain white flour (French Type 65) *, 650 ml water, 18 g fine (or table) salt, 15 g yeast and 100 g leaven.

*You can use a "strong" bread flour, if this is available.

Stage 8 - 16 min.

Knead on slow speed for 16 minutes.

Note: For the best way to knead, see: A few tips for effective kneading at home.

Stage 9 - 1 min.

Towards the end of kneading, add 50 g olive oil in a thin stream.

Stage 10

Tip: you can use the oil from the preserved (or sun-dried) tomatoes as the olive oil.

Stage 11 - 1 min.

Finish by adding 1 tablespoon dry oregano.

Stage 12 - 1 min.

Add the filling mixture...

Stage 13 - 2 min.

...and knead just enough to mix this in.

Stage 14 - 2 hours

Gather the dough into a ball, transfer to a large, clean bowl and cover with a plastic sheet.

Leave to rest for 2 hours.

Stage 15 - 20 min.

After resting, weigh out the dough into 300 g lumps and shape into balls. Leave these to rest for 30 minutes, covered with a plastic sheet (so that they do not form a crust).

Stage 16 - 1 hour

After this, reshape the balls and put into "bannetons" (baskets).

Leave to rise, covered with plastic as before, for 1 hour.

Stage 17 - 2 min.

Preheat the oven to 480°F (250°C).

Just before putting in the oven, slash the top of the bread.

Stage 18 - 25 min.

Bake for about 25 minutes.

Remarks

If you don't have any oregano, you can use thyme or a mix like "herbes de Provence" instead.

The yeast can be replaced with 300 g of soured dough.

Keeping

A few days in a cloth bag. Freezes well.

Source

Home made but dedicated to Arnaud the french-cretan guy.

Nutritional information

Whole recipe
Energetic value	Proteins	Carbohydrates	Fats
5,434 Kcal or 22,751 Kj	142 gr	823 gr	239 gr
272 %	55 %	78 %	36 %

Per 100 g
Energetic value	Proteins	Carbohydrates	Fats
228 Kcal or 955 Kj	6 gr	35 gr	10 gr
11 %	2 %	3 %	2 %

Per piece
Energetic value	Proteins	Carbohydrates	Fats
679 Kcal or 2,843 Kj	18 gr	103 gr	30 gr
34 %	7 %	10 %	5 %

% are calculated relative to a Recommended Dietary Intake or RDI of 2000 k-calories or 8400 k-joules by day for a woman (change to a man).

Possible allergens in this recipe: Milk, Gluten

How much will it cost?

For 8 pieces : 7.29 €
Per piece : 0.91 €

Change currency:

Note: Be careful, these prices are only an estimate, you can consult the table of prices by ingredients used for this estimate.

This recipe uses (among others)

	Plain white flour (French Type 65): You can get more informations, or check-out other recipes which use it, for example: Hamburger buns, Pizza dough, Loaf for "les filles'", Ocean bread, Roscoff loaf, ... All
	Water: You can get more informations, or check-out other recipes which use it, for example: Citrus crunch, How to fry eggs well, Pistachio powder or paste, Turnip and Jerusalem artichoke soup, French Family Cake, ... All
	Onion: You can get more informations, or check-out other recipes which use it, for example: Winegrowers' sausage casserole, Eggs en Cocotte à la Française, Bourguignon potatoes , Gratin du Nord, Roscoff loaf, ... All
	Feta: You can get more informations, or check-out other recipes which use it, for example: Feta and spinach brik pie, Rice à la grecque, Cretan salad, Cretan-style salmon , Greek style sandwiches, ... All

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