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Thanks to Gerry for his recipe and instructions.
A light, sweet and buttery Italian Christmas bread flavoured with orange and filled with dried fruit.
I’ve just bought a Kenwood chef and this recipe works really well with it – in fact, you’d be mad to make this without one! The only really difficult bit was finding a tin to cook it in. Traditional panettone tins are taller than they are wide so finding something this shape was a bit difficult. After considering the contents of my cupboards and scouring the cooking sections of various shops I gave up and ordered a loose bottomed panettone tin online. It was well worth it. I bought the larger size tin – about 7” – which is probably a bit too big for this recipe, the smaller – about 6” – is probably better. The dough is supposed to rise above the top of the tin and end up looking like a giant muffin, but the straight sided version I’ve cooked is just as nice.
Panettone is supposed to be difficult to cook. It’s not, but it does take rather a long time and it helps if you’ve got some experience of yeast cookery. Part of the flavour and texture comes from the long maturing process of the dough which is why it’ll take you most of a day to make one. I haven’t bothered myself but I suspect the process would benefit from leaving the first stage fermentation overnight in a cool place as you would for a sourdough bread. The rising times in this recipe are approximate as they will depend on how warm your kitchen is.
A note about flour – my first attempt was with very strong bread flour but I wasn’t happy with the texture. I got better results using a 50/50 mix of very strong bread flour and plain flour.
Ingredients
Approx 400g flour, half plain, half very strong bread
2 fresh eggs plus 2 fresh egg yolks
75g caster sugar
10g/1 sachet dried yeast – use fresh if you’ve got it
100ml handhot water
zest of 1 lemon
zest of 1 large orange
2 tsp vanilla extract (NOT essence – contents of a vanilla pod would probably work)
250g block of unsalted butter
200g dried fruit
50g candied orange peel
a dozen or so glace cherries, halved
a couple of feet of baking parchment
Begin by breaking two fresh eggs into the mixing bowl. Add about 75ml of lukewarm water, 10g or a sachet of dried yeast and 75g sugar. Start mixing with the dough hook. Add 125g of flour and work for a couple of minutes, stopping occasionally to scrape the dough off the hook and sides of the bowl. You should end up with a thick batter. Cover the bowl with clingfilm and leave in a warm place for a couple of hours. (see note above)
You should end up with a really soft, aerated dough. Add two fresh egg yolks, a couple of teaspoonful of vanilla extract, the zest of a lemon and a large orange and a good pinch of salt. Start kneading with the dough hook and work in a further 175g of flour. This should produce a sticky dough that has enough body for the dough hook to work.
Take a half pound block of butter and cut about half an inch off the end and put aside for later. Cut the butter into small cubes and, if necessary, soften in the microwave for a few seconds – don’t let it melt. Add to the bowl and continue to knead until all the butter is worked in. You will have to stop and scrape the dough off the hook and bowl several times to ensure the butter is mixed in completely. At this point the dough will be extremely soft and sticky.
Now comes the difficult bit – you have to get the dough to its final consistency. Continue to knead, adding flour until the dough is just stiff enough for the dough hook to work the dough. Carry on working the mix and it will eventually change from a sticky mess to a soft, silky dough. Form the dough into a lightly floured ball and place in the bowl, cover with cling film and leave in a warm place to rise – keep an eye on the dough, if it starts to look sweaty and glossy then the butter is starting to melt so it needs to be somewhere a bit cooler. After two to three hours knock back the dough and allow to rise again for an hour or two.
While this is happening, line your tin. Take some baking parchment and cut out a circle slightly smaller than the inside of the tin. Cut a strip the height of the tin plus about an inch by the diameter of the tin plus two inches. Fold up about an inch along the longer edge and cut every quarter inch or so to form a fringe – this will allow the paper to fit the tin and overlap the base. Lightly grease the tin so the parchment sticks, line the outer edge and then place the circle in the bottom over the “fringe”.
Next we add the fruit – a couple of hundred grams of dried fruit and 50g of candied orange peel. I used a fifty fifty mix of sultanas and raisins plus a dozen or so halved glace cherries but you can use whatever you like. Chocolate chips are popular, apparently. The fruit is supposed to be added dry but the raisins I had were a bit too dry so I soaked them in tea for a couple of hours. Brandy works well, too. (and I really must try Grand Marnier one day) Toss the drained fruit and peel in flour to stop them clumping then work them into the mix with the dough hook.
Place the dough on a floured surface and form into a smooth topped ball with no visible creases or seams – do this by stretching the dough slightly and tucking underneath, going round in a circle. Place in a tin lined with baking parchment, smooth side up, cover, and leave to rise a final time for an hour or so.
Treat the final risen dough with care – you can easily knock out the air if you handle the tin roughly. Using a very sharp knife, cut a cross in the top of the dough. Melt half the remaining butter -10 seconds or so in the microwave should do it – and brush over the top. Put the last knob of butter in the cross and place in a preheated oven at regulo 6/200 C for 10 minutes.
Reduce the temperature to regulo 4/180 C and cook for 30 to 50 minutes depending on the size and shape of the tin and the characteristics of your oven. The easiest way to test is with a skewer as you would a cake – once it comes out clean give it another 5 mins and it should be done. The tallness of the tin can cause uneven cooking with the consequent risk of burning the top – check after about 20 mins and if the top is looking a bit brown cover it with a disc of foil.
When cooked, wait a few minutes, remove from the tin (the parchment should make this easy) and allow to cool – don’t try to cut it for at least a couple of hours. It’s best eaten within 24 hrs – if you can make it last that long – but it’s great toasted for breakfast the day after.
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