High Altitude Panettone (Italian Christmas Bread)
Fluffy, lightly sweetened yeast bread, studded with raisins, dried apricots and crystallized ginger. This bread is fantastic warm from the oven, or toasted and buttered.
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Stand Mixer with Paddle Attachment (optional)
Ingredients
Starter
- 1 cup (4.3 oz) bread flour or all-purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- pinch instant or rapid rise yeast
- ⅔ cup warm water
Dough
- 2 ½ cups (10.7 oz) bread flour or all-purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- ⅓ cup granulated sugar
- 1 packet (2 1/4 tsp) instant or rapid rise yeast
- 1 ½ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ cup whole milk, warmed to between 110-115 F
- 4 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups chopped dried fruit (I used 1/2 cup each raisins, dried apricots and crystallized ginger)
- 1 tsp freshly grated lemon zest or orange zest
Instructions
Starter
- In a bowl, combine the flour (1 cup) with a small pinch of yeast (you can just take a pinch from the packet you'll be using for the dough) and warm water. Cover and let sit at room temperature for 8 hours, or overnight.
- The starter will slowly rise overnight, and in the morning, will have doubled in volume.
Dough
- In the bowl of your stand mixer (or in a large mixing bowl), combine the flour (2 1/2 cups) with the sugar, yeast, salt and cinnamon.
- Add the warm milk, melted butter, eggs, vanilla, and the starter.
- Use the paddle attachment to mix the dough until smooth and sticky, about 1-2 minutes, or just beat vigorously by hand with a wooden spoon or Danish dough whisk until smooth.
First Rise
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and set in a warm place to rise (such as inside your oven on the "bread proof" setting), for about 1 hour, until doubled in volume.
- Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula to gently deflate the dough, and add the dried fruit and zest. Fold the fruit in until evenly distributed.
Second Rise
- Butter the bottom and sides of a panettone baking pan, or just use non-stick baking spray. If using a makeshift "pan" made of parchment paper, you'll need to use spray.
- Scrape the dough into the pan, and set the pan in a warm place, uncovered, to rise until the dough has just reached the top edge of the pan or paper.
Bake
- Preheat the oven to 375 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven.
- Bake the bread for 45-55 minutes, until the top is a deep brown, and a digital instant read thermometer inserted into the bread reads 195 F.
- Let the bread cool for at least one hour before cutting. While you could cut it from top to bottom like wedges of cake, I find that this method causes the bread to crumble more. It works better to cut the loaf in half, then place the halves cut side down on a cutting board to cut straight slices, rather than wedges.
Notes
- The starter helps to keep the bread fresher for longer, as well as gives it a more developed flavor.
- You can use any type of dried fruit, such as raisins, apricots, ginger, pineapple, cherries, apples, mango, figs or golden raisins. Instead of fruit, you could also use nuts or even chopped chocolate. While candied fruit is traditional, this tends to be far too sweet, and often soaked in high fructose corn syrup. Dried fruit will have a better flavor and won't make the bread excessively sweet.
- After the bread cools, store leftover bread in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days, or in the freezer for up to 3-6 months.
- Leftover slices of bread are best toasted in a convection oven and slathered with butter.
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