South-France Provence bread filled with caramelized onions, walnuts and blue cheese. Served warm, cheese is soft and melting. You should try for an appetizer or as a starter.
A fougasse is a typical bread of South-France (especially French Provence). Either a kind of plain bread, shaped into a pattern resembling an ear of wheat, that replaces a baguette, or with all kinds of fillings. Then it’s eaten at any time of the day but it’s indeed ideal for appetizers. And you must know that the French just love to grab all kinds of delights at l’apéro.
This recipe can also be propose as a starter with green salad. Or served at picnics.
For a perfect fougasse as in France, here are a few information on the recipe:
- I used here Fourme d’Ambert blue cheese as I created this recipe for a cood contest organized by Fourme d’Ambert (and the jury actually liked it as I won and will be heading next spring to the Center of France to discover the region and its delights!). But you may replace Fourme d’Ambert by the blue cheese of your choice, preferably a creamy cheese rather that a strong one such as Roquefort. Why not with Stilton!
Walnuts are great, bringing a crunchy texture but it can be an option - For the fougasse dough, it’s made with olive oil as I told you it’s a south France specialty. But you can replace by your habitual bread preparation or even pizza crust.
- And for the shape: As you’ll see on the photos, I didn’t make the classic ear of wheat shape because I didn’t want melting cheese to run away from holes or to have too small parts sith more bread than feeling.
Fougasse Bread, Blue Cheese and Onion Filling
A bread filled with caramelized onions, walnuts and blue cheese. Served warm, cheese is soft and melting. You should try for an appetizer or as a starter.
Ingredients
Fougasse
- 250 gr flour
- 150 ml water
- 5 gr salt
- 50 ml olive oil
- 12 gr yeast dried bread yeast or half if yeast is fresh
Filling
- 2 to 3 large onions
- olive oil
- salt
- pepper
- 70 gr blue cheese Fourme d'Ambert
- 75 ml cream
- 5 to 8 walnut
- 1 beaten egg or cream for gilding
Instructions
Start by making the fougasse dough.
- Mix the yeast with warm water (not too hot though). Then add all the ingredients and knead in a food processor at medium speed for a few minutes. Reserve in a warm place covered with humid cloth and let it rise for at least 30 min to 1 hour (for example a warm part in the house or the oven at 30 °C).
If you use a Magimix CookExpert: Water + yeast with the bread / brioche program. When the program stops, add all the ingredients and press auto. I like restart the program a second time.
Meanwhile prepare the filling:
- Heat olive oil in a frying pan and sliced onions and fry. Add salt and pepper. Fry until onions become translucent. I like them to cook long so that they become almost caramelized then sooo tasty! (as in mu caramelized onions recipe but it’s not necessary).
- Heat the cream in a pan, add 25 gr of blue cheese cut into small pieces and mix until it melts and you obtain a cream more or less homogeneous. Let the cream set in the fridge, it will solidify a little bit.
Assemble the fougasse:
- Preheat your oven to 220 °C. Spread the dough on the baking sheet covered with parchment paper. Cover the central part with blue cheese cream. Arrange walnuts (each walnut cut into 4 to 8), onions and cubes of the remaining Fourme d'Ambert. More or less depending on your taste.
- Fold the sides of the dough to form a kind of flattened loaf. Brush with fresh cream or a beaten egg for a nice golden brown fougasse.
Bake
- Bake for about 20 minutes until bread dough is cooked. Ideally serve warm
Notes
The main steps: Prepare the fougasse dough, let it rise. Heat the cream and dissolve the blue cheese inside and let it cool down. Pan fry onions onions. Then assemble and bake.
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Bon appétit !
