Here’s my Friday. I went to build a garden and my crisper had other ideas. No peppers worth using, sad-looking herbs, nothing I wanted to put my name on. And honestly? I wasn’t that upset about it. Because I’ve been itching to get back to the Ligurian all week. So that’s what I baked tonight. No garden. No flowers. Just focaccia the way Genoa built it. Take a look at that top. See how it’s wet and glossy, how the salt is riding on the surface instead of sinking in, how every one of those dimples is holding a little pool? That’s a salamoia. It’s a brine. Water, salt, and olive oil whisked together and poured straight into the wells before it bakes. It’s centuries old, and it’s the whole reason a real Genoese focaccia has a top that shatters when you bite it. That’s where our garden focaccia comes from. All of it. The dimples we’ve been talking about all week, the deep press, the oil pooling in the valleys and frying the bottom. None of that is decoration. It came off the docks in Genoa where guys ate this with one hand because it was cheap and it kept them going. We just started putting flowers on it. The dimples went all the way to the pan and held. Crumb came out open and irregular. Deep golden, not pale, because color is flavor and I wasn’t pulling it early. Tomorrow we build the garden. And you’re set up for it. You know to oil every single piece. You know the soft herbs wait until the last ten minutes. You know to skip anything watery and lay your tomatoes face down. And you know to press deeper than feels right so your picture anchors instead of sliding off a bubble. Four rules. That’s the difference between a loaf that blooms and one that burns. Doors open 5 AM ET. Bring your dough, bring your garden, bring your questions. And tell me something before you go: what’s actually in your crisper right now? Because half of you are going to open that drawer tomorrow morning and improvise, same as I did tonight. That’s not a failure. That’s just baking. Perfection is not required. Progress is.

Morning, everybody. Today we’re baking focaccia, and we’re doing it two ways so nobody sits this one out. If you keep a starter alive, there’s a path for you. If you don’t, there’s a path for you too. Same bread, two roads, and neither one is the lesser version. Here’s how the day works. The yeasted path (bake today). This is your same-day bake. Mix this morning, let it rise while you go about your Saturday, dimple it, oil it, bake this afternoon. Warm focaccia on the table by dinner. If you’ve never made focaccia before, start here. It’s the most forgiving loaf you’ll ever pull out of an oven. The sourdough path (start today, bake tomorrow). Focaccia with a levain is an overnight bread. Mix it today, let it bulk slow, cold-proof it in the pan overnight, and bake tomorrow morning. If you fed your starter last night and it’s ready to go, you can run it on a longer same-day schedule, but don’t rush it. The tang and the open crumb come from the wait. Two things that decide whether your focaccia is good or just fine, no matter which path you take: More oil than feels reasonable. In the pan and on top. Focaccia fries a little on its bottom. That’s the point. Bake it darker than feels comfortable. Pale focaccia is underbaked focaccia. Push the color. Now the part that makes it a bake-along. Post in this thread as you go. Show me your dough after the first rise. Show me the dimples before it bakes. Show me the crumb when you tear into it. If something looks off, post it and ask. Somebody here has hit the same wall and climbed over it, and that’s the whole reason we bake together on Saturdays. Recipe’s here so you’re not guessing: Free Recipe Pantry, focaccia recipe: https://recipepantry.app/recipes/summer-garden-focaccia https://recipepantry.app/recipes/sourdough-summer-garden-focaccia Hunter Members, the market version with the scale slider and cost math lives in Recipe Pantry Pro: https://from-oven-to-market.lovable.app/pro

So I pulled up an old favorite, adapted it for a Pullman, and baked it in my 13x4x4” pan. I left the lid off this time. Two reasons. I wasn’t sure the dough would behave in a closed pan, and honestly, I like the crown. That domed top with a few sesame seeds scattered across it does something for me. It came out better than I hoped. Soft, feathered crumb. Rich flavor without being heavy. The kind of loaf that makes a ham sandwich taste like you did something special, and turns leftover egg salad into a real lunch. The hardest part of this whole bake? Waiting for it to cool before you slice in. This dough is enriched, so while it bakes your whole house fills with a smell you’ll want to bottle. Cutting early ruins the crumb though, so be patient. Let it set. I wrote the whole thing up. It’s live on the Recipe Pantry now. Go bake it yourself. https://pantry.bakinggreatbread.com/recipes/enriched-sesame-sandwich-loaf Perfection is not required. Progress is. ~ Henry ⭐🔥

A Story About What’s Happening Inside Your Starter. Every sourdough loaf gets its flavor long before it ever becomes dough. Before shaping. Before proofing. Before baking. It happens in the jar. Most people chase flavor by changing recipes. Different flours. Different hydrations. Different techniques. But flavor isn’t hiding in the recipe. It’s already being decided inside your starter. Once you understand what’s happening there, flavor stops being a mystery and starts becoming a choice. https://youtu.be/gub1kAZVJ_Y

To every dad in Crust & Crumb Academy today, this one’s for you. I think about what it means to bake as a father. It’s not a small thing. You’re carving out time in a life that doesn’t hand you much of it. You’re learning something that takes patience, and if you’re anything like me, some of your best bakes happened late at night when the house went quiet and the kitchen was finally yours. But here’s what I know. Your kids see you in that kitchen. They see you try something hard. They see you fail at it, and come back to it, and get better at it. That matters more than any loaf you’ll ever pull out of the oven. I have four kids, Reid, Payton, Nolan, and Ryan. Every one of them has stood in my kitchen at some point watching me work a dough. I don’t know what they’ll carry from that. But I hope they carry something. So if you baked this weekend, good. If you didn’t, good. If someone made you breakfast and you ate it slowly and didn’t rush off anywhere, even better. You belong here. Keep baking. Keep showing up. Happy Father’s Day, gentlemen. 🍞 ~ Henry⭐️🔥