Panettone Recipe: Orange and Raisin Christmas Bread With a Pistachio Option

Panettone is having a good Christmas in British bakeries. Bakery Info reported on 19 October that Sainsbury's range includes a Pistachio Panettone at 12 pounds, serving ten, made in Tuscany by the Corsini family with pistachio creme, candied fruit and chopped pistachios, on sale from 7 October. A British Baker roundup of 30 October lists panettone on the festive menu at Birley Bakery.

The loaf is Milanese. Wikipedia's account of panettone gives two versions of the legend of a baker named Tony and a noble's daughter, from which the name pan di Tonio is said to come. The traditional bread is made with hard-wheat flour, raisins and candied orange and citron, and the true version is cured over several days with a sourdough-like dough, very rich in fat and needing intensive mixing.

This is a home version with ordinary yeast, ready in one afternoon. It is not a sourdough panettone, and it will not have the cloud-like crumb of a three-day bakery loaf, but it is buttery, perfumed with orange and vanilla, and far better than most boxed ones. It needs a stand mixer or strong arms, and patience with the rises.

Ingredients

Makes 2 panettone of about 700 g each. Total time about 5 hours 45 minutes, mostly rising and cooling.

• 500 g strong white bread flour
• 7 g instant yeast
• 150 ml lukewarm whole milk
• 100 g caster sugar, plus 1 teaspoon for the starter
• 4 egg yolks and 1 whole egg, at room temperature
• 8 g fine salt
• 200 g unsalted butter, softened, plus 20 g for the tops
• Zest of 1 orange and 1 lemon
• Seeds of 1 vanilla pod, or 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 150 g raisins, soaked in 2 tablespoons rum or hot water for 30 minutes, then drained
• 100 g candied orange peel, chopped
• 2 paper panettone moulds of 750 g capacity

Method

1. Mix 100 g of the flour with the yeast, the teaspoon of sugar and the lukewarm milk. Cover and leave for 30 to 45 minutes until bubbly.
2. Add the remaining flour, sugar, egg yolks, whole egg, salt, zests and vanilla. Knead on low speed for 10 minutes, until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the bowl.
3. Add the 200 g butter a few pieces at a time, kneading until each is absorbed. Keep kneading for 10 to 15 minutes more, until the dough is glossy and stretches into a thin windowpane. It will be soft and sticky.
4. Cover the bowl and leave in a warm place for 1 hour 30 minutes to 2 hours, until doubled.
5. Knead the drained raisins and candied peel in briefly. Divide the dough in half, shape each piece into a tight ball and set one in each paper mould, which should be about half full.
6. Cover loosely and leave for 1 hour 30 minutes to 2 hours, until the dough domes about 1 cm below the rim of the mould.
7. Heat the oven to 180 C (160 C fan) with a shelf in the lower third. Cut a cross in the top of each loaf with a sharp blade and press 10 g of butter into each cut.
8. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, covering loosely with foil after 20 minutes if the tops brown too quickly, until deep golden and a thermometer in the centre reads 92 to 94 C.
9. Immediately push two long metal skewers through each loaf near the base, through the paper, and hang the panettone upside down between two tall, sturdy objects for at least 4 hours, so the crumb does not collapse.

Pistachio swap, storage and serving

For a pistachio version, replace the candied peel with 100 g roughly chopped unsalted pistachios and the raisins with 100 g dried sour cherries, and keep the orange zest. Scatter a few more pistachios on top before baking.

Wikipedia notes panettone is served in vertical wedges, often with a sweet wine such as Moscato d'Asti, or with mascarpone cream. Wrapped airtight, the loaves keep for 5 days; stale slices make excellent toast or bread and butter pudding.

Bake them this weekend, wrap one as a gift, and you will have made the most talked-about loaf of the Christmas shops yourself.