- Weekend Brunch Flatbreads – Recipe - 22 January, 2016
- Winter sea salt brownies – Recipe - 19 November, 2015
- Grilled Aubergine Bruschetta - 19 August, 2013
I adapted this treat from Dan Lepard’s brilliant flatbread recipes. It’s pretty much one of my favourite things to eat, very adaptable and quick to make too.
I tend to double the flatbread mix and put 4-6 individual portions of flatbread dough into the freezer to use later. You can easily defrost individual portions with 2-3 mins in the microwave, so make them in the evening and have them as lunch throughout the week.
The topping can be absolutely anything, so these are also quite a good way of using up leftovers. Courgette, mushrooms and a strong cheese is my favourite veggie option at the moment. You just need to lightly fry any vegetables before you bake the flatbreads, but everything else can go on as it is.
I made these after a Saturday morning trip to the gym when I was desperately trying to stop myself from having a well deserved fry up. Because of the eggs I probably wouldn’t recommend these as leftovers, but they do make quite a nice weekend brunch option. Eggs and cheese feels like a suitably filling combination to ride out the snowpocalypse and the spring onions and parsley add a nice touch of colour, and at least a token amount of healthy green things.
Ingredients
Makes 4 flatbreads
50g coarse cornmeal (I used fine cornmeal in one recipe and it didn’t make a huge difference)
100ml boiling water
150ml cold water
7g sachet fast-action yeast (about the equivalent to 1 tsp)
300g plain flour, plus extra for kneading and shaping
1 tsp salt
25ml sunflower oil
For the topping
4 eggs
Half a bunch of spring onions
Grated cheese, about a handful for each flatbread (I used a mix of cheddar and parmesan but mozzarella works well too)
Fresh parsley
A little bit of olive oil
1. Add the cornmeal and hot water to a bowl, stir and leave for a couple of minutes. You want it to look quite thick and paste like. Add cold water and stir again.
2. Before adding the yeast make sure the cornmeal and water mix isn’t too hot. It’s pretty unlikely after adding the cold water but anything hotter than lukewarm can kill the yeast. Add yeast, flour, salt and oil.
3. Mix everything together in the bowl. The resulting bowl will be quite sticky so you may want to use a spoon for mixing at this point. Once everything is combined, cover with a dishcloth or cling-film and leave to rest for 10 mins.
4. Spread a thin layer of flour across a kitchen surface or large chopping board and knead the dough for a couple of seconds. Return to the bowl, cover and leave to rest for half an hour.
5. While the dough is resting you may want to chop up the spring onions and parsley for your topping and grate the cheese.
6. Once the dough is done, separate into four equal sized balls. Flatten the individual dough portions with your hands and gently pull at the edges till you have a roughly oval shape, slightly bigger than your hand.
7. Cover the dough with cheese, brush the edges with some olive oil, season with salt and pepper and bake for 8 mins at 240C (220 fan assisted). Take the flatbreads out, crack an egg on top of each and bake for another 8min. Sprinkle with the chopped spring onions and parsley.
