Tigella Bread of Modena ( Italy)

Modena is located in Emilia Romagna, known as the culinary bread basket of Italy. Tigelle are the quintessential food of Modena, a symbol of pride.

In Modena, many people own a cast iron tigelliera (see photo) to make their tigelle stovetop. It is also common there to have an electric tigelliera cooking device. You can also use your griddle on the stove top.. Since I do not own a cast iron tigelliera, made this on a stove top sandwich toaster . Don't worry, the result will still be satisfying.

This week for BM I choose International Flat Breads. When I was looking up wiki I found this name. Looked up google to find more about it. I was easy to make since it uses the normal bread dough. But as you read above it requires a special mold. One look at it and I decided to use the stove top sandwich toaster and let me tell you got amazing results.. Once baked, tigelle have a soft center, and a crisp crust. To be eaten, they are split open with a knife, then filled in a variety of ways.

You must try this recipe its keeper and can be had with any filling as a brunch too

Ingredients

1.1/2 Cups All Purpose Flour
1.1/4 Teaspoon Instant yeast
2 Tablespoons Oil
1/2 Teaspoon salt

1/2 Teaspoon sugar
1/2 cup warm water and more to knead into a soft dough

Method

Mix the yeast into the warm water and stir.
Add the salt to the flour and then the oil. Mix the oil into the flour first, till it looks like bread crumbs. Add the yeast, sugar, water and mix to make a soft dough. Knead the dough until smooth. Cover and let rise for an hour. I kneaded the dough in the previous morning and kept it in the refrigerator. The next day it had risen perfectly.

Roll out the dough to about 3/4 ” high. Use the top of a water glass / katori or bottle cover to cut disks. ( make sure it fits in the gas sandwich toaster mold).

Cover and let rise again for about 10 to 15 minutes. I made half of the dough and then started cooking them. By the time I finished this lot the remaining had risen perfectly.

Lightly grease the mold and lay in the tigelle. Cover with top and cook on low flame until brown spot appears and it puffs up. Flip the mold so both sides cook. If using a griddle, just flip them. When cooked, cut open and fill.

Traditional filling is Italian prosciutto minced with garlic and fresh rosemary. or cheese or nutella. We had it nutella. It is amazingly delicious, we enjoyed this for our breakfast.