Coca

This dish's recipe is from the Balearic Islands (islands off the coast of Spain) and I found it in our Culinaria Spain cookbook.

It’s a baked flatbread they call “coca” which is their local word for cake. The introduction for it says:

Bread is a staple food, and this is taken seriously on the Balearic Islands. Here, baking is seen as an important skill, and coca is regular fare. There are all sorts of variations: with yeast and without, with egg and without. The base can be wafer-thin or voluptuously well risen. The filling spread on it varies across the range: vegetables, as a first course, sardines, as a main course, or a sweet filling, as a dessert.

           As I learned while making it, bread making is a very important skill to have. Although it is somewhat difficult, it is definitely not as complicated as I had thought.

                For coca, you have to make the dough first. We started by proofing the yeast by adding it to warm water with a pinch of sugar.

I stirred it up and let it sit on the stove top under the overhead light until it had doubled in size. Meanwhile, I scooped 9 cups of flour into a bowl and made a well in the center big enough to fit all of the yeast. The yeast was then mixed with the flour along with some olive oil, white wine, and water.

I kneaded it into a "smooth dough". I hadn't known exactly what that meant until making this dough. We proofed it again, this time in the oven. During the wait we prepared the coca toppings. Here are the goods:

Each one would get a spinach base, so I washed and chopped the spinach.

One of the smaller cocas was going to have pine nuts, white raisins, and pineapple. We soaked the raisins so they wouldn't get too dried and shriveled in the oven. The second small coca would have vegetables and sprats. The biggest coca was going to be all-veggie, so we prepared the onions, peppers, and tomatoes. The last two cocas would each need a healthy amount of garlic, so I crushed some up.

 Finally the dough had doubled in size, so I cut it in half.

I then cut one of those halves in half so that we had 3 dough balls for 3 different cocas. Each was then rolled out and patted into crusts of varying thicknesses. Instead of using baking sheets, we decided to use stones so the crust would cook evenly. They were wrapped in foil and buttered for the coca dough to go on top. I poked holes into the dough and brushed olive oil over top before sprinkling the spinach on.

I topped the all-veggie coca with peppers, onions, tomatoes, garlic, and artichoke hearts. This one was made on a thick crust.

Next was the sprat coca with garlic, onions, and peppers. This one was a thin crust.

And finally, the pineapple, pine nut, raisin coca. This crust was also thick.

They each cooked for about 30 minutes. The veggie coca was ready first, so that was our first course.

The sprats had gone in second, so they came out as our second course. This one was a bit crunchier than the other two because its crust wasn't as thick.

And the pineapple coca was the last. They were all delicious