Healthy Italian Bread Recipes

Crunchy on the outside and slightly soft in the center, these easy homemade breadsticks are a good way to use your sourdough starter. Substitute 1 tsp. of fresh starter for the active dry yeast, adding it with the olive oil and malt syrup. No barley malt syrup? Use molasses instead.

Long, crispy, thin breadsticks like these grissini are laid right on the tablecloth at many Piedmontese restaurants.

A typical calzone packs almost 800 calories and 25 grams of saturated fat. In this healthier calzone recipe, we use lean chicken sausage to keep fat in check and add nutrient-rich spinach to bulk up the filling without adding calories. Serve with marinara sauce for dipping.

Talk about easy! Almost everything in this pesto-cranberry tart is store-bought. Although the tart can be enjoyed shortly after it comes out of the oven, it's just as good served at room temperature.

This distinctive loaf boasts a beautiful bouquet of herbs baked into the crust. Flavored with more herbs, it's a fine accompaniment to savory dishes, but is also delicious toasted, with honey.

In less time than you can drive to the store and back, this homemade pizza dough is ready.

Using our quick food processor pizza dough or purchased dough, these stuffed turnovers are as easy to make as a flat pizza. If you like, serve the calzones with a bowl of extra sauce for dipping.

Use this quick dough for one large pizza or four calzones.

Flavorful Parmesan makes this homemade bread addictive.

Straight from the oven, this flatbread (actually a pizza crust with a light savory topping of onions and herbs) is a satisfying snack. Focaccia is equally at home on a party buffet or as an accompaniment to soups or salads.

Get homemade breadsticks on the table fast--without any kneading or mixing--when you start with prepared pizza dough, then top with dried oregano and Asiago cheese. For a crispier texture more like grissini, roll the breadsticks long and thin and bake until golden.

No bakery degree required for this recipe: these healthy, savory sun-dried tomato-and-Asiago scones are as easy to make as a batch of muffins. White whole-wheat flour adds a boost of fiber, and just enough butter gives them great flavor and texture without going overboard on calories. Try them with brunch or alongside your dinner salad.

This authentic Tuscan chestnut bread recipe, castagnaccio--not exactly bread and not sweet enough to be considered cake--is in a category by itself. Serve this Italian delicacy on a cheese platter or as part of an antipasti spread.

Puffy, chewy-crisp and fragrant with fresh herbs, this Parmesan focaccia goes well with soups, stews and, of course, Italian-style fare. Be sure to use only fresh herbs and avoid the temptation to stir them into the dough (sprinkle them over it); many herbs, including the ones called for here, inhibit yeast growth when they're combined in the dough. The dough bakes on the lowest rack in a very hot oven to simulate the hearth baking that is traditional for focaccia. Recipe by Nancy Baggett for EatingWell.

Breadsticks are a great accompaniment to so many meals. Here we press olives and rosemary into prepared pizza dough for a super quick and easy version.