Globecooking recipe : Algerian Fougasse

You may remember a while ago, I shared a recipe for French-style Cheese & Bacon Fougasse. After looking up the origins of the dish on Wikipedia, I noticed that there is also an Algerian version, stuffed with a spicy vegetable sauce similar to the one used in chakchouka. I love the fact that I knew what this meant without even going to check ! - it's a bit like ratatouille and you can see my Chakchouka recipe here.

Algerian Fougasse

ingredients :

600g flour
200g water
2tsp dried yeast
2tbsp olive oil
1tbsp sugar
1/2tsp salt
2tbsp dried oregano
2 onions
1/2 red pepper
1/2 green pepper
3 tomatoes (or 1/2 tin chopped tomatoes)
1tbsp tomato puree
2tbsp Moroccan spices (chermoula or ras el hanout for example - or a mixture of ginger, smoked paprika, cumin, black pepper)
1 cup grated cheese

Put the flour in a bowl with the yeast, salt, sugar, olive oil and oregano. Add the water.

Use a wooden spoon then your hands to bring it all together into a ball of dough. Knead for a couple of minutes then leave in a warm place with a teatowel on top of the bowl while you prepare the filling.

Put the red and green peppers and the onions in a frying pan with a drizzle of oil and gently cook for 5-10 minutes until they are soft.

Add the tomatoes (this is a great way of using up squishy, over ripe tomatoes) and the spices and leave to simmer for 5 minutes. Stir in the tomato puree. Leave to cool.

Roll out the dough on a floured table.

Keep going until it's about 1cm thick.

Spread the veggie filling on one half.

Sprinkle with grated cheese.

Cut the traditional diagonal slits.

Brush over a little milk or butter to get a nice golden finish. I used Smen butter which is typically Moroccan but regular butter would be fine.

Bake at 180° for 20 minutes until golden brown.

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If you want some more Moroccan treats, how about trying Briouates stuffed with Spinach & Meat, Fish Tagine, Chicken with Olives & Preserved Lemons or Kefta Meatball Tagine?