Gochujang Chilli Cheese Focaccia

What I made whilst I was ill

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Did you know this week is national chocolate week? So obviously the recipe I have for you this week is...focaccia. If I’d been more on top of things, I’d have given you something fabulous and chocolatey, but sadly something got in my way. Sickness.

I don’t know if it was being a little run down from the book tour or my nephew's 1st party, or a petri-dish combo of the two, but this week was almost a complete washout; I was knocked out by some cold/flu nastineess. Thankfully, I started feeling much better yesterday, but spending much time in the kitchen this week was a big fat no.

I didn’t want to leave you without a recipe, so I tried to find something that was both relatively straightforward and would make me feel better, plus, of course, delicious and interesting. When I’m ill, I often crave three things. Carbs, spice, and cheese. This bread recipe absolutely works on all three fronts. Let me introduce you to my gochujang chilli cheese focaccia.

I’ve only seen the first episode, but after posting a teaser of this on Instagram the other day, I was reliably informed one of this year's Bake Off contestants made some sort of gochujang bread, so I guess I’m at least ‘on trend’. I adore gochujang, the Korean fermented chilli paste. I have a container of it in the fridge at all times. It’s the base for many classic Korean dishes (Tteokbokki, I’m looking at you!) and it’s a great ingredient to add some heat and depth to almost any dish. I’ve made gochujang spiked croque monsieur; I used it in place of tomato puree to make a fantastic ragu, and after my trip to Seattle, I want to start adding it to cookies!

For this recipe, I wanted to make it super low-effort (I had very little energy and I wanted to get back on the sofa to get back to the more important things, like hibernating with the dog and watching mindless crap TV) but maximise the flavour. The flavour of this bread comes in multiple forms. First, there is gochujang in the dough, giving it both flavour and a beautiful orange colour. Then the dough is massaged with chilli oil (I used my favourite Laoganma 'Peanuts in Chilli Oil') and dimpled with cheese. Once baked, the finished focaccia is topped with spring onion and a generous grating of parmesan.

Even with my head being completely bunged up, this smelt and tasted amazing. My usually silent postman even commented on the amazing smell when he handed me a parcel. It's got a nice kick from the gochujang and chilli oil, a bit of freshness from the spring onion, and it's all brought together by the cheese. Speaking of the cheese, for this bread I used mozzarella but you can use whatever you have on hand. If you decide to follow my lead I would reccomend using a low moisture mozzarella, you dont want lots of water released as the bread bakes so classic balls of mozzarella should bee avoided in this particular recipe.