I'm on my phone right now so it's hard for me to find links but look up Samin Nosrat's ligurian focaccia. I know it's on her website. It's an overnight recipe and it is maybe the best focaccia I've ever made. If you find her salt fat acid heat series, I think on Netflix she makes it in the first episode.

Hi Jason, long-time reader, first-time commenter. I recently discovered the Bread in 5 method by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois, and it has quickly become a regular part of our household's diet. Easy to pick up, excellent quality, and I've found that with a few modifications (more flour, add a little bit of sugar, split the dough into two at the first pass), one can really make first-rate homemade bread. We keep a loaf of factory bread in the freezer for backups, but once you get into a routine with this, it's hard to go back. Love your work, keep it up.

I asked my pal David, friend of the blogs and student/philosopher of the Way of the Bread, for some focaccia advice and he worked up this document for me (shared with permission). It is perhaps a little much for my lazy ass, but perhaps with a little time, I will ease into this level of commitment.

I can't recommend Peter Reinhart's Artisan Breads Every Day enough. All the recipes are optimized for the home cook and I've had incredible results, have made Focaccia and Ciabatta a bunch of times

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1580089984

Focaccia is so easy because you can go with a super high hydration and you don’t need to worry about shaping the bread, the pan holds it in shape for you. So kick it up to 75/80 and beyond. I haven’t looked at any of these attached recipes but I really recommend doing a biga/poolish with about 30% of your flour and then mix the rest of your flour, water and salt, lol the night before. Let the biga sit out and the other batch keep in the fridge overnight. When the biga is ready cut it up and work it into the other batch along with the rest of your yeast. Don’t knead just fold, half the time as a first ferment and then the second half let it proof in your cast irons. Bake it hot and you'll have an amazing crust on the bottom.

I adapt Jeffrey Hamelman's recipe, using mostly (1/2-4/5) white 00 as well as some whole wheat bread flour, einkorn, and/or semolina. I think it’s his ciabatta with stiff biga recipe.

I like a dry-er, flat-ish-with-rosemary style for munching on unadorned, which I used to only be reliably able to get at Princi... the Starbucks-affiliated bakery chain 😬. (People complain about Japan's access to cheeses and their lack of 'harder' breads, sourdough can be a wash too.)
I'm not sure what you'd call the bread Il Buco Alimentari down in the Village used to use for their sandwiches but it was just salty perfection, prosciutto and grated parm and oil drizzle and rucola ✌️

There’s a 50/50 chance I first heard of this from you, but this “5 minute” baguette recipe is surprisingly great and easy. https://youtu.be/Z-husjZkxHw

Ooh, focaccia is great, because it's trivially easy to make good-enough focaccia. At one point I got into just doing full-on 100% hydration focaccia, which makes it VERY moist and bubbly, though maybe that's not necessarily what you always want?

Hi Jason, I had to pop in here just to say that Emma's focaccia recipe you linked to on YouTube is fantastic! I'd never made bread in my life, but recently found her recipe somewhere online and have made it three times now — it's already become a family favourite, and is super soft and delicious (especially when still a little warm). We aren't big olive fans so keep it simple with just fresh rosemary from the garden and chunky salt flakes, and I have to say I've been kicking myself for not learning how to make this earlier. I've really been missing out!

I have found that if you want that nice crispy crust, a cast iron skillet is the way to go. The alarming amount of olive oil that most recipes tell you to use (which you should listen to) does will not go to waste when there is cast iron involved. (That I also preheat my skillet and then butter it for cornbread means that I have very well seasoned skillets.)