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Grissini (Turin Breadsticks)

Name: Grissini (Turin Breadsticks)
Prep time: 2 h
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 2 h 20 min
Yield: 6 servings
Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients: 500 g flour (Italian 00 or plain); 5 g dried yeast; 10 g salt; 280 ml lukewarm water; to taste semolina or flour for dusting

The breadsticks of Turin. The dough is ordinary bread dough — flour, water, yeast and salt — but stretched pencil-thin and baked, it ends up as crust with no crumb at all. It was made in 1679 for a young prince who could not digest the crumb of bread, and it keeps for weeks.

Ingredients

6servings

Steps

Dissolve the yeast in the water, mix with the flour and salt and knead for 10 minutes to a smooth dough.
⏲ 10 min
Cover and leave an hour, until doubled.
⏲ 60 min
Heat the oven to 200°C. On a dusted board, press the dough out into a long rectangle about 1cm thick.
⏲ 15 min
Cut strips 1.5cm wide across the short side. Hold each strip by both ends and spread your arms to stretch it to 30-40cm. It should end up thinner than a finger.
⏲ 15 min
Lay them on trays without touching and bake 15-20 minutes, until evenly pale gold and one snapped in half is crisp right through.
⏲ 18 min
Cool completely on a rack. Keep in a dry tin.
⏲ 20 min

Variations

Rubatà. The old form, rolled out under the palms to 40-80cm and knobbly along its length, from the country round Chieri near Turin.
With olive oil or lard in the dough. Softer, and it does not keep as long.
Sesame, salt or rosemary on top. Brush with a little water just before baking and scatter.
With prosciutto. The usual way to serve them as an antipasto.

Tips

Keep the thickness even. Thick places stay damp inside while thin places burn first.
Lay them apart. Where they touch, they do not dry.
Snap one to check. If it breaks crisp right through, they are done.
Pack them only when cold. Put away warm, the steam softens them.

More detail and the reasons why (2)

Bread that is all crust. Shokupan puts baguette at the all-crust end and pumpernickel at the no-crust end and places itself between. Grissini go further than the baguette. According to Italian Wikipedia, the dough is exactly that of ordinary bread, but the long thin shape bakes evenly and, the dough being so thin, the result is in practice bread of crust alone, with no crumb. The story of its invention turns on the crumb too: a Turin court baker made it in 1679 for the future king Vittorio Amedeo II, who could not digest the crumb of bread.
Why there is no oil. The same article says oil or lard makes grissini softer but shortens how long they keep. It is what biscotti says when it calls the absence of fat the condition for keeping. How the dough is stretched matters too: the stirato, pulled out to the length of the baker's arms, is more friable than the rolled rubatà.