How to Make Homemade Ciabatta Bread

If you have just started making bread in the comfort of your own home and feel like your skills are improving, you may be eager to take it to the next level. While bread-making takes some time to master, the right recipe makes all the difference. Take your bread-making skills up a notch and try to make your own ciabatta bread. Chewy and soft, it's the perfect bread to make for just about any occasion. If you're searching for ways to make your homemade ciabatta bread baking a success, look no more. Keep reading as our Bob's Red Mill Bread Experts take you through each step of the ciabatta bread-making process, to ensure that you create the perfect loaf. 

What Is Ciabatta Bread?

Now, before we discuss how to make this delicious bread, it's crucial that we first talk about what it is and where it came from. Understanding the history of this mouthwatering bread will help you gain more insight into why a rigid step-by-step process must be followed when making it. 

So, what is ciabatta bread exactly? Ciabatta bread is a rustic Italian white bread that, like many other loaves of bread, is made with flour and yeast. It has a crispy-chewy crust and a hole-filled interior that makes eating this bread quite a memorable experience. Its unique shape gives it the name ciabatta, which in Italian can be translated into the word "slipper." Like a slipper, a loaf of ciabatta bread has an elongated, broad and fattish shape. It's widely popular in both the United States and Europe and commonly used as sandwich bread. While the texture of the bread differs slightly depending on the region in which it made, most ciabatta bread recipes feature the light and airy feel that we have come to know and love.

Pair it with delicious organic oil, or enjoy it freshly baked with butter. No matter how you choose to enjoy your slice, it's nutty flavor serves as a delightful treat that you will surely enjoy.

Difference Between Ciabatta and Focaccia

There's often some confusion around the differences between ciabatta and focaccia bread. While they have similar-sounding names and are both Italian style bread, they are very different. The most significant difference between the two is that ciabatta is a bread shaped into loaves, whereas focaccia is a flatbread. Ciabatta bread also features a much chewier texture because it does not contain any fat. Focaccia usually has oil (olive oil) in its dough and features a much softer feel. 

Tips to Follow Before Baking Ciabatta Bread

• Because ciabatta dough is a very wet dough, it can be hard to handle. When making it, you'll likely have the urge to add more flour to the mixture throughout the process to make it more manageable. Avoid adding flour if possible. Adding too much flour to the dough will result in a more dense bread instead of a light and airy ciabatta loaf.
• Because wet dough does not stick to wet surfaces, it's essential to keep your surfaces and hands moist throughout the process. This will make managing the dough much more manageable.
• If possible, weigh your ingredients instead of dry measuring them. Using a kitchen scale while making a homemade ciabatta bread recipe is the most accurate way to measure, especially when baking bread.

How to Make Ciabatta Bread

When it comes to making ciabatta bread, it's a tad more complicated to make than other bread. The difference between ciabatta bread and the rest is that the dough needs a sponge to ensure that it remains light and airy. Because the sponge needs to be prepared before the actual bake, it's crucial to set aside time in advance before making your loaf, preferably the day before.

Ciabatta bread is also different from other bread, in the sense that it requires a lot of water and is a slightly wet dough. In fact, ciabatta dough is so wet that it can be ruined if too much flour is added. Knowing the basics of ciabatta bread making before you get started, will allow you to make ciabatta bread with little hassle.

Take your time to review this article and learn more about how to make homemade ciabatta bread.

Step by Step Process of Making Ciabatta Bread

Choose the Right Flour

The method of bread making requires little steps to be successful, once of which is choosing a high-quality flour. High-quality flours like our Artisan Bread Flour provide a premium, high-protein base to create a delicious butter-like and nutty-tasting ciabatta bread that is out of this world heavenly.

Pre-Ferment

We talked about the importance of a pre-ferment or "sponge" when creating ciabatta bread, and this step is necessary to create the ideal texture. When preparing your ciabatta bread sponge, we recommend making your bread starter the night before in the same bowl that you will begin to make your bread. To ensure your sponge is ready, first, check that it has the consistency of pancake batter.

Measure

Before making your ciabatta bread, it's important to measure out all ingredients and make sure you have enough of each. Achieving the right ratio is a crucial part of the success of your bread. Once all components have been weighed and measured, add them to the same bowl as your pre-ferment.

Mix

Now that everything is in the same bowl, it's time to mix it. It's important to combine all ingredients thoroughly by first staring with a traditional beater and then following up with a dough hook. Doing so will help your batter take shape and create the ideal texture. Once you mix the dough, you may notice that your bread mix is more batter-like than dough-like. But, don't add more flour just yet. The secret to achieving the legendary holes in ciabatta bread is moist dough. The more flour you add, the less light and airy your bread will be. That being said, because the wet mixture is hard to handle, you may need to add small amounts of flour along the way. Whether you choose to add a bit of flour to the dough, or just flour your hand while you're shaping it is up to you.

If you begin working the dough and notice that it's a bit jiggly, that's okay. Try to work with the moist dough as much as you can to achieve the great ciabatta texture and add only enough flour to remove stickiness.

Searching for an easy-to-mix ciabatta recipe that even the kiddos can help out with? Turn this No-Knead Artisan Bread into your ideal ciabatta bread loaf.

The Stretch, Fold and Ferment

Now, we've talked about the wetness of ciabatta dough. While wet mixtures can make it harder to shape bread, it also changes how the bread needs to be kneaded. Instead of kneading ciabatta bread the way yeast dough is kneaded, ciabatta bread must be allowed to slowly ferment through a series of stretching and folding—much like when you make baguettes. This stretch and fold method allows the different layers of gluten to build the dough structure and redistribute the heat, creating the ideal environment for the yeast to grow correctly.

A typical ciabatta dough will ferment for about three hours and need to be briefly stretched and folded between each fermentation. To extend and fold the mixture with ease, make sure that your fingers are damp and that the dough is folded back down onto itself. Continue stretching and folding the dough until all four sides are complete. 

Shape the Dough

Once the dough has fully fermented, it's time to shape it. To shape dough properly, it's essential to have the proper tools on hand. A lightly floured work surface, flexible bench scraper and parchment paper are all tools that will make it easier to shape your loaf of ciabatta bread. 

To begin shaping your loaf, start by dampening your hands and placing a piece of dough on the parchment paper. Stretch and pat out the dough to a flat rectangle shape. While the dough may be sticky to work with, wetting your hands before working with it will make it more manageable. After you're done shaping the dough, dust the tops with a bit of flour and cover with a towel. Let the loaves rise for an hour or longer, depending on which recipe you're following.

Bake It

Baking your ciabatta bread is the last step standing between you and a delicious loaf. To cook your bread perfectly, start by filling a bowl up with ice cubes and setting it near the oven. Next, add the ciabatta bread onto your preheated surface, pour the ice cubes into the skillet and quickly shut the oven door. Bake the ciabatta bread according to your recipe and until the tops are golden brown.

While making ciabatta bread is a system that requires both practice and patience, even imperfect loaves will taste incredible. Each time you try your hand at making this delicious Italian style bread, you'll learn something new along the way. We hope that this complete guide to making ciabatta bread has prepared you for your next homemade bread baking journey. Now, let's get baking!