I am going to be honest, I am not a baker. And I am certainly not a bread baker. But when I originally found the no-knead bread recipe published by Mark Bittman in the New York Times, originally created by Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery in Manhattan, the world of bread baking was completely transformed.
Who knew you could bake a crusty loaf of bread in your home kitchen without the technique of kneading? I was instantly amazed.
But then I realized, the 4-ingredient no-knead bread recipe is such a fantastic base, why not make it more interesting? And since olives are one of my pantry staples, as they are so prominent in Mediterranean cuisine, I knew I was on to something. So I got to work.
After a few trials and errors, this olive loaf bread became my new favorite. Warm from the oven, my husband and I simply couldn’t get enough. Once we tried it with Olive Oil Bread Dip, it was simply perfection. It makes a great go-to bread to bring to all of our upcoming holiday parties, too! Just think of this rustic bread as a delicious way to impress all your friends!
What is Olive Bread?
Olive bread, sometimes referred to as olive loaf (not to be confused with the cold cut version studded with olives), is a bread where the loaf of bread is laced with whole or chopped olives. This ensures a quintessential olive artisan bread flavor.
Where did olive loaf originate?
From my research, the olive loaf recipe seems to have originated in the Mediterranean, mostly in Italian and Greek cultures. And it makes sense since olives are such a staple ingredient in this region. Many times, you will find artisan bread makers with a version of olive bread in their shops. But today, it can easily be made in your home kitchen!
What is an olive loaf made of?
Homemade olive bread requires 5 simple ingredients:
- Bread Flour
- Active Dry Yeast
- Kosher Salt
- Lukewarm Water (more on that later below)
- Chopped Kalamata Olives (but you can use any of your favorite olives – more on that below)
How to make olive bread?
This no-knead olive bread comes together in 3 folds.
- First, mix the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Pour in the lukewarm water. Mix with a wooden spoon. At this point, the dough will be sticky.
Stir in chopped kalamata olives and ensure they are evenly distributed throughout the dough. (Feel free to also use your hands!) Cover the bowl with a clean kitchen towel and allow it to rest 18-24 hours in a warmer part of your kitchen.
PRO TIP: Warm water is very important to activate the yeast. Though you might ask, what is the exact temperature you are referring to when you say, “lukewarm water”?
Typically, this is a temperature between 100-110 degrees. You can use an instant-thermometer to know for sure. If you don’t have one, you can simply stick your finger in the center, if it feels slightly warm to the touch, you are good to go!
- Second, transfer the dough from the bowl onto a lightly floured surface. It will be sticky. But if you gently remove the olive bread dough from the bowl, you will notice it will all come out easy and fold onto itself. If you need a visual, be sure to check out the quick how-to video in the recipe card below.
Form the dough into a ball by tucking the sides of the dough under. Transfer to a large piece of parchment paper, lightly dust with flour, cover with a kitchen towel and allow to rise once more in a warmer part of your kitchen until doubled in size, 1-2 hours.
- Lastly, towards the end of rising time, place your dutch oven in the oven and preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. When ready to bake, remove the very hot dutch oven from the oven with potholders.
Using the edges of the parchment paper, carefully place the dough in the dutch oven, cover and bake for 30 minutes. Then, remove the lid and bake another 20-25 minutes, or until golden brown. Remove the olive loaf from the dutch oven and place it on a cooling rack to cool for 30-45 minutes before slicing.
PRO TIP: To know for sure that your bread is fully cooked through, once you remove it from the dutch oven, gently lift it over and tap the bottom of the bread loaf. If it sounds hollow, it’s done!
An important tip for using olives
Make sure the kalamata olives are completely drained as this rustic loaf recipe is already very moist and sticky. To ensure your olives are completely dry, chop first and pat them with paper towels to get rid of excess liquid.
Is olive bread healthy?
Yes, especially a dutch oven olive bread. Since olives have heart-healthy fats and we are making the bread from scratch with top-quality bread flour, it is good and good for you! So go ahead, have two, ahem, three slices!
What to serve with olive bread?
The rustic olive bread recipe is absolutely divine with Olive Oil Bread Dip (and a glass of wine!). But with the colder months coming, it also pairs perfectly with hearty fall and winter soups. Try it with Vegan Butternut Squash Soup, Ribollita Soup, Lentil Soup, Turkish Red Lentil Soup, or Homemade Vegetable Beef Soup.
Olive Loaf Variations
The beauty of this rustic olive bread recipe is the number of variations you can make. I would recommend replacing the olives altogether or adding one additional ingredient to keep it simple. Here are a few of my favorites:
- Olive Cheese Bread: Add 1 cup shredded white cheddar
- Green Olive Bread Recipe: Replace the purple kalamata olives with chopped green olives
- Olive and Herb Bread: Add 1 teaspoon each dried thyme and oregano to the dry ingredients
- Olive Garlic Bread: Add 1 tsp garlic powder to the dry ingredients
- Black Olive Bread: Replace the kalamata olives with black olives. I especially like the extra special briny bite of pitted, black oil-cured olives.
- Sun-Dried Tomato and Olive Bread Recipe: Add 1 cup sliced sun-dried tomatoes
- Olive Tapenade Bread: Replace the chopped olives with ½ cup strained olive tapenade
- Rosemary Olive Bread Recipe: Add 2 teaspoons dried rosemary
- Walnut Olive Bread: Add 1 cup chopped, toasted walnuts
A few tips for making the best recipe
- Can I freeze this olive bread? You sure can. As a matter of fact, I usually make a few loaves on the same day. Let them cool completely, slice, place in freezer bags, and freeze until I am ready to use. When ready to serve, I toast a slice (or more) and serve.
- Do I have to slice it before I freeze? Can I freeze the whole loaf? You can. However, (1) be sure to place it in an airtight container (I usually wrap it in a clean kitchen towel, place it in a freezer bag, and get as much air out as possible), and (2) be sure to thaw it in the fridge overnight before serving.
- What is the best size of the Dutch oven to bake this olive loaf? I have made this baked bread in 3 different sizes of Dutch ovens and brands and they all worked well. The brands and sizes are as follows (the links below are affiliate links)
Le Creuset Signature Cast-Iron Round Dutch Oven, 3 1/2-Qt
Lodge 6 Quart Enameled Cast Iron Dutch Oven
Staub Cast Iron 5.5-Qt. Round Cocotte - A few requests for whole wheat olive bread have been mentioned. I have not tested this recipe with whole wheat flour as the structure and protein content is different than bread flour. If you are adventurous and want to try a whole wheat version of this bread on your own, I would start with replacing 25% of the bread flour with whole wheat and work your way up from there. I would love to know the results if you try it out!
Other bread recipes you might also like
- Brioche
- Foolproof Challah recipe
- Turkish Simit
- Easy No-Knead Skillet Bread – From Baker Bettie
- Bread Maker Olive Bread Recipe – From Family Spice
Homemade No-Knead Olive Bread Recipe
Ingredients
- 3 cups bread flour (360 gr. )
- ¼ teaspoon active dry yeast
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt*
- 1 ⅓ cup lukewarm water (between 100-110 F degrees) (316 ml)
- 1 cup chopped kalamata olives drained well
Instructions
- Mix the dry ingredients; bread flour, active dry yeast, and kosher salt, in a large mixing bowl.
- Pour in 1 ⅓ cups (316 ml.) lukewarm water.
- Give it a mix using a wooden spoon. At this point, the dough needs to be quite sticky. Stir in the chopped olives and ensure that they are equally distributed throughout the batter. (Alternatively, you can use your clean hands to mix and feel the stickiness.)
- Cover the bowl with a clean kitchen towel and let it sit in a warmer part of your house for 18-24 hours.In my tests, I found that the bread baked after 18 hours of rising time was perfect, but the 24-hour one was also good. One important thing to mention here is that at the end of the rising time you might see a thin (kind of hard – for the lack of a better word) layer at the top of the dough. Don’t be alarmed by that. In the next step, we will fold that into the dough and since it is a sticky one, the additional rising time will help soften it.
- Lightly flour a piece of parchment paper, gently remove the dough from the bowl, and place it onto the parchment. While removing, you will realize that it is quite sticky. However, if you take your time and gently pull it by folding it onto itself, you will see that it will come out easily without any dough remaining in the bowl. For a visual, be sure to watch the video below.
- Form the dough into a ball tucking the sides of the dough under. Lightly dust it with a little bit of flour, cover it with a clean kitchen towel, and let it rise for 1-2 hours or until it doubles in size. Again, I recommend letting it sit in a warmer part of your house.
- Towards the end of the rising time, place your dutch oven in the oven and pre-heat it to 450 F degrees.
- When ready to bake, carefully take the now-very hot dutch oven out of the oven. Using the edges of the parchment paper place the dough into the dutch oven. Put the lid on and bake for 30 minutes. Then remove the lid and continue to bake another 20-30 minutes or until the top is nicely golden brown as you see in the photos.
- At the end of the baking, remove it from the dutch oven, place it onto a cooling rack and let it cool for 30-45 minutes before slicing.
Video
Notes
- I use Diamond Kosher Salt. If you are using Morton Kosher Salt or table salt, please use half the amount of salt.
- It is imperative that you drain the olives well.
- When using olives in any recipe, it is best to give them a taste. If they are too salty, I would recommend letting them soak in water for an hour or so. Obviously, the longer they sit in the water the less salty they will become. Alternatively, you can use less salt, but I personally prefer to adjust the saltiness of the olives instead of using less salt. Because I like my bread dough to be properly seasoned.
- Storage: After it comes to room temperature, cover it with a kitchen towel and keep it on the kitchen counter. It should still be good the next day.
- Freezing: You can freeze the whole loaf or slice it before freezing. Just make sure that it is fully cooled before doing so. Additionally, be sure to place it in an airtight freezer bag and get the air out as much as you can to prevent freezer burn.
- Thawing: If you froze it sliced, you can warm the slices in your toaster without having to wait for it to thaw. If you froze it as a whole, it is best to let it thaw in the fridge overnight.
Sara Pecchia
Hi again
I tagged you on instagram to show you my olive sundried tomato bread. I’m not sure if I did right. Can you see my bread?
Sara
Aysegul Sanford
No!!! I want to see it. Can you share it again?
Did you tag @foolproofliving??
I am so bummed. So sorry.
Will you send it again? I’d love to share.
Hollie
Have you tried making this with strong wholemeal flour? I have some in the cupboard so was hoping to try a wholemeal version.
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Hollie,
I tried it with whole wheat flour and the results were not very good.
Unfortunately, it fell flat so sadly I do not recommend using a different flour than bread flour for the best results.
I hope this helps.
melanie tellinghusen
Is parchment paper a must?
Aysegul Sanford
Himmm, I think it is. Quite honestly, I’ve never tried without parchment paper. I am assuming that it could stick to the pan. However, if you were to cover the bottom with some flour it might work.
I hope this helps.
Jillian
Ah. May. Zing.
I’ve never made a no knead bread before, and this was just stupid easy. SO GOOD!
Can’t wait to try with sun dried tomatoes too. Yum.
Also, I don’t have a dutch oven, and a round glass casserole dish tented with heavy duty aluminum foil as a “lid” worked perfectly. (At least I think so!)
Aysegul Sanford
This is simply music to my ears Jillian. I love that you tried making it in a glass casserole covered with aluminum foil. That is so creative.
Thanks for sharing. Cheers!
Sara
Hi I’m the process of making this bread. Looking forward to tasting it. But one question I notice after I let it rise 24 hours there was like a dry crust on top the dough, is this normal. It’s inside my oven now for the last rising before I bake. Please let me know.
Aysegul Sanford
Yes, it is. It will clear as it bakes. Hope it turned out well.
Cheers!
Sara Pecchia
My gosh so delicious just as if I bought from bakery but better! Thanks for the recipe. Definitely a keeper . Not sure how to upload here so you can see it. Trying Your chickeN fracases recipe too.
Aysegul Sanford
YAY! This is music to my ears. I have one in the oven baking as well as I type this 🙂
So glad to hear you liked it Sara.
Cheers!
Sara Pecchia
Aysegul,
I made this again but I’m wondering if my oven is too hot. Bottom of the bread is very dark almost like burnt. Should I lower the temperature.? Or Bake it less time? Thanks Sara
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Sara,
Do you have an oven thermometer by any chance? If not, I would start by baking a few minutes less (perhaps 5-10 minutes).
If that doesn’t work, then I would try to start with 425 F degrees.
I hope this helps.
jeanie short
The crusty no-knead olive bread turned out really good. Now I want to try the same recipe and use dried Cranberries and pumpkin seeds can I just replace the olives for the fruit and seeds, please let me know as soon as possible so I can make another loaf. cheers
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Jeanie,
I am so happy to hear that you liked this recipe. I just made a loaf of it this morning 🙂
You can use other things like dried fruit and nuts and seeds. However, I recommend starting with smaller amounts like half a cup of each. Then depending on how it tastes you can add more.
I hope this helps.
Cheers!
Chiara
Hi! What if I do not have a Dutch pot? Thanks!
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Chiara,
Unfortunately, this recipe only works with a Dutch oven.
Valerie
I do not have a dutch oven. I have two cast iron skillets. I put the bread in the bottom of one and placed the other on top. Worked fine. Bread was awesome.
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Valerie,
Good to know. I am happy to hear that you liked this bread recipe. Thanks so much for sharing your experience.
Cheers!
Darly Spacey
Gorgeous photos and that bread looks absolutely amazing!Thanks for the recipe.
Aysegul Sanford
It tastes really good too 🙂 Thanks for coming by.
Barry Kidby
I bake a lot of different loaves but never tried a no knead loaf before, so I thought I’d give it a go and it came out perfect, I used black pitted olives. The dough is very wet and sticky so it does need a high heat.
Aysegul Sanford
So happy to hear that you liked this recipe. I am not much of a bread maker myself, but when such an easy recipe exists it is hard not to want to bake delicious breads.
Thanks for coming by and taking the time to leave a review.
Cheers!
Anne
Can you make this with AP flour?
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Anne,
Sadly, it will not work with all purpose or whole wheat flour.
I tried. Sadly, it was a big fail.
I hope this helps.
Dee
I made it with all purpose flour and it turned out great! Maybe was a little smaller but it was crusty and delicious and moist on the inside. I made it with canned black olives.
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Dee,
I am so glad to hear that it worked for you. Thanks for sharing.
Ozlem
Dear Ayse,
Following your story on insta I came here to print the recipe but just noticed that the scale option only increases the cup amounts but the grams stay the same. Maybe this is a technical error that you can fix?!
In case other people want to try out the recipe, they should follow the cup measurements.
Thanks for terrific recipe. I will try to bake this tomorrow.
Selam
Ozlem
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Ozlem,
I will look into that. Thanks for pointing it out.
However, I would not recommend doubling this recipe. If you want you can make 2 separate loaves but I doubt that you would get good results if you do try to double the recipe to make a larger loaf. Not sure if that was your intent but I wanted to make sure that I let you know.
I hope you’ll like it as much as we do. Let me know how it turns out.
Best,
Aysegul
Ozlem
Thank you Aysegul. Just wanted to point it out so that you are aware in case it’s a technical error.
I made one loaf for breakfast and the whole family loved it! Very good & easy recipe. Thank you.
Aysegul Sanford
Glad to hear you liked it. Thanks Ozlem.
Sanae matsui
Looks so good I like to try to make the bread but my question is I do not have Dutch oven pan can I use any baking pan ??
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Sanae,
Sadly, what makes this recipe magical is the fact that Dutch oven creates an oven-like environment for the dough. I know some people tried making it in cake pans, but I can’t guarantee that it would work. I am sorry that I wasn’t able to provide you with a helpful answer.
AE
This is wonderful! I was lucky enough to have some olives from Ayvalık and it turned out delicious!
Aysegul Sanford
Lucky you! I want some Ayvalik olives 🙂
So glad it turned out great. Cheers!
Zaitun
If I don’t have a Dutch oven can I use a bread baking nonstick? Thanks
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Zaitun,
Can you please elaborate on what you mean by “bread baking nonstick”? I am not familiar with it.
Still, if I am being honest, I am not sure if this recipe would work with anything than a dutch oven with a lid.
I hope this helps. If you can provide me with more information I’ll do my best to help you further.
Traci | Vanilla And Bean
You know how much I love homemade bread, and olive bread is right up there with my favorites! What a fabulous, helpful and through post, Ayse! I wanna rip into that boule!
Aysegul Sanford
Oh how I wish I can share this with you my friend. Thanks so much for all your kind words. ❤️
Alanna Taylor-Tobin
This post is epic!! Olive bread was always my favorite and this recipe looks PERFECT. Love all the variations too. And gorgeous photos as always!
Aysegul Sanford
Awww you are the best Alanna. Thanks so much for your sweet words. ❤️
Andra
It really looks great! I was wondering whether I could bake it in another type of a glass, oven-safe dish, as I do not own a Dutch oven?
Aysegul Sanford
Hi Andra,
I am glad you liked this recipe.
To be honest, this recipe works because of a dutch oven. However, if you read the comments for this post and my other no knead bread recipe you will see many readers making it in various containers. It is hard for me to say yay or nay, but I hear a lot of people make it work with other kitchen tools.
I hope this helps.
Toni
Thanks for the recipe! It was really amazing! My family loved it!
Aysegul Sanford
So glad to hear that you liked it Toni. Thanks for coming by.
Katie
When a recipe for bread comes with the word crusty in the title you know it’s going to be good- and this did NOT disappoint! I love it! The olives add a unique flavor profile that I’m so excited to have tasted! And can I just add how simple this was? So good!
Aysegul Sanford
Oh this is music to my ears. Thanks so much for coming by and leaving a review. So happy to hear that you liked it.
Lauren Kelly
I am so excited to make this! I am so happy it’s no knead. It looks incredible.
Aysegul Sanford
Thanks Lauren!
Laura
This looks so delicious! Perfect side dish for any meal. Thanks
Aysegul Sanford
Can’t agree more. Thanks Laura.
Maurels
Is 1/4 teaspoon of active yeast correct? I feel like that’s very little?
Aysegul Sanford
Yes, it is correct.