stromboli
What’s better than pizza? Pizza in a different shape!
Okay, so stromboli isn’t exactly like pizza, but it’s pretty darn close. It’s like a sauce-less pizza rolled up into a delicious coil… and I have to admit, the coil makes it really fun to eat. You can eat it plain (like I do) or dip each slice into sauce. It’s great both ways.
This stromboli is only as expensive as the ingredients you decide to put inside of it. Ever since I made the salami Italian sandwiches back in December, I’ve wanted salami again. So, even though it was a lil’bit pricy, i sprung for it. I also used provolone cheese because it goes great with salami and some banana pepper rings that I had leftover in the fridge. It was PERFECT.
Oh, and FYI, I totally intended to make a big green salad after all of that gooey Jalapeno Popper Mac n’ Cheese, but the grocery store was out of kale so I had to put the salad that I had planned on hold till my next day off, which is Wednesday. So, hang in there. I’ll have something healthy soon. Promise.
Stromboli
Stromboli
An Italian stromboli filled with salami, spicy banana peppers, and provolone cheese.
Ingredients
DOUGH
- 1 tsp active dry yeast $0.11
- 1 Tbsp sugar $0.01
- 3/4 cup warm water $0.00
- 1 tsp salt $0.05
- 1/2 Tbsp olive oil $0.08
- 3 cups all-purpose flour $0.30
FILLINGS/TOPPINGS
- 1/3 lb. salami $3.23
- 6 slices provolone cheese $2.50
- 1/2 cup banana pepper slices $0.90
- 2 Tbsp olive oil $0.32
- 1 tsp Italian seasoning blend $0.05
Instructions
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Combine the warm water, yeast, and sugar, and stir until dissolved. Let that sit for about five minutes or until it becomes frothy on top. After five minutes, stir in the olive oil and salt. Pour the yeast mixture into a large bowl and add one cup of flour. Stir until smooth.
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Continue to add flour, a half cup at a time, until you can no longer stir it with a spoon. At that point turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead for about five minutes, adding more flour as you go. Knead in flour until the dough is soft, but no longer sticky. You should use roughly 2.25 to 3 cups of flour total. Form the dough into a ball, place it back in the bowl, loosely cover it with plastic, and let it rise for 1-1.5 hours, or until double in size.
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Once the dough is double in size, take it out of the bowl and place it on a floured surface again. Pat the dough down into a rough rectangular shape and then gently stretch and coax the dough into a larger 12×18 inch rectangle. Stretching the dough rather than rolling it with a rolling pin will give you a fluffier end product.
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Arrange your toppings over the dough. Roll the dough up so that it forms an 18 inch log. Place the rolled dough on a baking sheet and brush with the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Sprinkle the Italian seasoning over top. Allow the stromboli to rise for about an hour.
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Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Bake the stromboli for 25 minutes or until golden brown on top. Slice the stromboli into 12 pieces, about 1.5 inches each. Enjoy!
Step By Step Photos
First stir together the warm water, yeast, and sugar. Wait about five minutes or until the top gets very frothy. It’s hard to see the thick layer of very fine foam on top of the liquid here, but it’s there. Those big bubbles are actually on top of the foam. Once it gets foamy, stir in 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil and 1 teaspoon of salt.
Add the yeast mixture and one cup of flour to a large bowl. Stir until it looks smooth like this. Then continue to stir in more flour until it becomes a sticky ball of dough.
At that point, turn the sticky dough out onto a floured surface and knead in more flour until you reach about 2.5 to 3 cups total flour total and have kneaded for about 5 minutes. The end product should be a soft but not sticky ball of dough that springs back when you poke it with a finger.
Put the dough back in the bowl, cover it loosely with plastic, and let it rise until double (1-1.5 hours).
Take the risen dough out of the bowl and put it on a floured surface. First press it down into a rough rectangular shape and then gently stretch it into a larger, 18×12 inch rectangle. Don’t be tempted to use a rolling pin, it will squash the dough.
Next, lay your toppings on the dough. You don’t need to put the toppings on thick because once you roll it up, the toppings will be in 2-3 layers.
Yummm… banana peppers. You can kind of clean out your fridge with this, but just try to avoid ingredients that have a lot of moisture because that will give you a soggy stromboli.
Roll the stromboli up along the short side, so that you end up with an 18 inch log (stromboli, I mean).
Paint the stromboli with some more olive oil, sprinkle it with Italian seasoning, and then let the stromboli rise. Rise, stromboli, RISE! (about an hour).
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and bake the stromboli for about 25 minutes or until it is golden brown. I’ll admit, I only let my stromboli rise for about 30 minutes and the toppings inside were cold, so it didn’t rise much… but it was still incredible!
Then just slice it up and eat!
Strombolis are very popular in the northeast, US, but not so well known in the west or down south. There is no reason not to include some pizza sauce inside the stromboli, or at least to serve it separately for dipping. Both vegetarian strombolis and cheese steak strombolis are among my favorites and are very popular in general as well. Strombolis can be made any size and it is good to use a very sharp knife to cut a number of diagonal slits in the top of the stromboli just prior to baking for the release of steam. The dough at the ends should be folded under to prevent leaking during baking. When knocking on the top surface with a knuckle like knocking on a door produces a hollow sound, it means that it is probably done. I like to bake in a thoroughly heated 500 degree F oven on a pizza stone if available. Swiss cheese is a delicious way to go, particularly when combined with provolone and or mozarrella.
I usually make stromboli with pop-can dough, but I’ve recently decided to make all my breads, doughs, and baked goods from scratch. I found this amazing recipe and thought to give it a try. It went perfectly (proofing, kneading, rises, filling, shaping, oil, topping, and all) until the very end when I took it out of the oven and saw the top had split lengthwise down the middle. It still tasted wonderful (more like an open stromboli), but do you have any ideas about what went wrong?
Can this be frozen?
It would probably freeze decently.
Hi,
When you say, “turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead for about five minutes, adding more flour as you go” are you flouring the surface and then adding additional 1/2 cup of flour when needing? Or are you just adding flour to the surface? I do not have a perforated pan or a cookie sheet ( with no sides), can I use a baking sheet?
You’re sprinkling flour on the work surface as you knead to prevent sticking and to work additional flour into the dough. Between the first one cup flour in the bowl, the extra that you stir in with a spoon (1/2 cup at a time), and the flour used to dust the surface as you knead, you’ll use about 3 cups total. The total flour amount can vary, though, depending on the moisture content of the flour and the ambient humidity.
Just made this today and it came out perfect, looked just like your picture. The dough is fantastic. I had salami that I needed to eat up and so glad I found this recipe. Thank you!!!
Your recipe looks great! Although you appear to be an experienced bread baker I just wanted to mention that salt often inhibits the growth of yeast – your stromboli may have risen higher if you added the yeast with the flour, rather than directly into the yeast mixture. Just a suggestion – I love to make bread and experiment with different methods.
Thanks for an outstanding blog – I enjoyed reading through your SNAP challenge series and can’t wait to try some of your recipes.
I started making your recipe two years ago, My family absolutely loves it and requests it quite often! For the insides I use provolone, ham, salami, and pepperoni. Since I have to make my husband his very own roll i use banana peppers, pepper jack cheese, and if i have them on hand diced olives along with the other toppings i listed.
I just made this and it was soooo good. I now have a signature dish to bring to any potluck party in the near future!
I’ve been making stromboli for years! I’ve always used rhodes bread, found in the frozen section. Let it thaw and rise. I also dice up the meat and cheese.
Had pinned this ages ago and made tonight–no changes except subbing a ball of Trader Joe’s pizza dough for the homemade. So good!
Mine didn’t turn out, I don’t think the 1 tsp. of active dry yeast was enough…for some reason it didn’t get real foamy to form a good rise.
That can also sometimes happen if the water is too hot or if the yeast is old.