It’s been a while since I took the bread and pizza making classes with Gabriele Bonci. Two years in fact. In the meantime he’s been a very busy guy. Bonci’s not only published a book here in Italy (which is coming out in English in October!) he’s refurbished his original Pizzarium, and opened a new bakery as well as continued to develop menus at Open Baladin and No.Au.
Yet somehow he still finds hours in the day to share his doughy knowledge teaching cooking classes. I’ve been lucky enough to take a total of five classes with the man, (the links to those posts are down below). While he does give out recipes, taking a class with Gabriele is more about learning technique. In the end, dough is dough is dough. You can talk about quantities and quality, but according to the master, it’s all in the handling. And what hands. I have to admit that half the fun of taking a class with Gabriele is watching this massive guy handle his dough with a choreographic delicacy that is unique.
So when I found out that Gabriele was giving a special class on Easter breads, I jumped at the chance. And brought my video camera of course.
Right now, when you read ‘Easter bread’, you were probably thinking sweet stuff, right? While Italy does have its share of Easter sweeties (Colombe, etc.) it’s the cheesy savory breads that most people get excited about.
We started out the class making Pizza al Formaggio. This is the type of typical cheesy bread that you run into all over central Italy, especially in Umbria and Campania. Everyone has their own recipe and way of doing it, but a common thread is lots of cheese, eggs, butter and oil. In other words, it’s a bomba.
You’ll find Gabriele’s recipe below. But of course, as always, it’s all about the handling of the dough. So I’m including this rather long video (12 minutes) with my voice over (sorry, don’t know how to do subtitles!) But don’t worry, I’m also posting the original video, so you can experience Bonci in all his unique Bonciness.
Pizza al Formaggio
First you have to prepare the liquid yeast:
200 grams of millk
10 grams of dry beer yeast
20 grams of white sugar
Mix these ingredients together, then let them sit at about 30C for 40 minutes.
1 kilo flour (Manitoba Flour, Type “0”)
150 gr of olive oil
400 grams of softened, unsalted butter
15 gr salt
60 gr ground black pepper
30 gr sugar
300 grams egg yolks
300 gr whole eggs
500 grams grated cheese ( 1/2 pecorino, 1/2 parmesan)
1/2 kilo of Emmenthal (Swiss) cheese, cut into 4 inch logs
Mix the ingredients following the instructions in the video.
Divide the dough into three bread pans that have been lined with parchment.
Stick three cheese logs into each bread (see video)
When the dough has tripled in volume, bake in a 190C oven for 25 minutes.
The bread is better when it rests for a day.
Here are links to my previous Bonci posts:
Making Pizza Dough with Gabriele Bonci
Pizza as Canvas: Creative Toppings with Gabriele Bonci
Two Cool Pizza Tricks (Bonci Again!)
Bread Making with Gabriele Bonci
Bonci Pizza 2: Having fun with Pizza
Gabriele Bonci: The Michelangelo of Pizza
Here is the original video, without my annoying voice over:
Pizzarium
Via della Meloria, 43
Panificio Bonci
via Trionfale 34/36
For a full list of Bonci’s classes visit the Tricolore web site , where the schedule is updated monthly.
Bellissimoooo! Così posso ripassare la lezione. :))
I have to send you the photos I took of you. Very cute!
So great to see him make that dough! I want to come back to Rome just for that.
Oh, what a tremendous lesson. What a tremendous man! You have some people in Italy – call them “food personalities” or what you will, who really are larger than life. We have our Paul Prudhomme, our Mario Batali, but your men are a much greater joy. Like Dario Cecchini, Bonci exudes a joy for life and love of his craft that are wonders to behold. You’re right; that dough is beautiful. Thanks for the video. It’s the next best thing to being there. And not to worry, the voice over is better than subtitles.
Do you know if he ever does classes in English? His site looks like it’s all in Italian. I can speak Italian well enough to get by in a class, but my husband, who is seriously into food and cooking doesn’t speak any.
Sometime ago he was doing english classes with an interpreter. You had to pay extra for it though. I learned to make his recipe through YouTube and applied Sullivan’s tips on cooking it
He was doing it via an interpreter
Yes, you can arrange to have an interpreter there during class.
Great lesson! I love this guy!
Swiss cheese and not pecorino? Colour me shocked. I’ve been wanting to make this for years as I love it but seeing the quantity of certain ingredients… Better not (no wonder it is so good!)
Yes, I was surprised too. But I asked about four times, just to make sure about the Swiss cheese.
He’s the man,… the dough man…what a lucky gal you are to get to participate in his classes. Thanks for sharing it with all of us!
Hi Elisabeth!
Thanks for sharing the video. It’s as if being in the class. So helpful. I think I’ll try this one.
One thing I’m curious about. After the dough is ready, does he leave it to rise a first time before going on dividing and shaping the pizza al formaggio and letting it rise the final time?
Thanks and love from Istanbul.
Semsa
Hi Elizabeth!
Greetings from Amsterdam! Thanks to you I’ve baked pizza al taglio at home and enjoyed it with friends and family! Going to make it again this weekend and hopefully improve it further.
I would love to follow one of Gabriele Bonci’s classes but the website http://www.tricoloremonti.it doesn’t seem to load properly. Is there any other way you know of I could subscribe?
Many thanks and keep up your great blog,
Taco
Thank you and so glad to hear about your pizza adventures! Unfortunately Tricolore is no longer hosting Gabriele’s classes. As of last week, they still hadn’t found a place. As soon as they do and I hear something, I”ll post something about it.
Elizabeth:
I’ve been looking forward to trying this recipe as well as the Tortano since you posted thiese wonderful videos. Now as Easter is approaching, I am gathering supplies. I even found a source for the Panibois molds and mulino Marino manitoba tipo 0 flour (though shipping flour from UK to US is certainly not cost effective). The last detail I am obsessing over is the yeast. Most discussions of using beer yeast that i have read suggest steering clear of the practice, except possibly with ale yeast. I know a key step is the fermenting liquid that Bonci creates to begin this bread. Is there a specific type of beer yeast that he recommends? Do his other recipes use the same or more traditional yeasts?
When Bonci was making this for the class he used dried quick acting beer based yeast. No need to over fret if you’ve got all your other ingredients in line.
Quali sono i tempi di lievitazione? Si può far lievitare in frigo per 24h?
Yes, you can let it rise in the frigo for 24 hours