Pandoro, which literally means "golden bread", is a traditional Italian Christmas sweet bread, originally from Verona in northern Italy. It is similar to Panettone, another sweet bread eaten at Christmas time, but much less rich and usually unfilled. It is incredibly fluffy and soft and smells deliciously of honey, vanilla and citrus zest - irresistible, if you ask me!
In Italy, no one in their right mind would make this bread at home, because it's readily available in supermarkets and bakeries for a good price. Here in Auckland on the other hand, one could spend a fortune on these overseas delicacies. So I decided to make it myself.
I've tried to make Panettone in the past, twice, and failed, twice. Someone told me that Pandoro is much easier to make and I have to agree. For this recipe, I merged two recipes from Bake Street and Tavolartegusto together and adjusted them to my liking. The result is a perfectly golden bread with the typical soft and chewy interior.
The process is a bit lengthy - it takes two to three days to make this bread. Don't try to rush it, the slow rise builds up the flavour gives the dough its characteristic structure. Make sure that you have the right type of flour, which is Manitoba flour, or at least very strong bread flour. I would prefer to have made this bread with fresh yeast, but couldn't get any on short notice. However, I found that active dry yeast worked well enough.
Also, I didn't have the typical star shaped Pandoro baking mould, which are available on Amazon or AliExpress. Luckily, my crown bundt tin worked a treat. The important thing is that you chose a baking mould that is tall and leaves enough room for the dough to rise. You don't want anything narrow as you want as much fluffy interior as possible.
Lastly, I don't recommend to attempt this without a sturdy stand mixer. In order to build up the gluten in this enriched dough, it requires a lot of kneading - 15-20 minutes after all the ingredients are added. I don't know how long it would take to knead this dough by hand.
The process has three "stages" of dough:
- - the lievito, a wet pre-dough.
- - the first dough in which you add flour, butter and egg to the lievito
- - the second dough in which you add more flour, egg and the spice mix
After that butter is folded in, very much like when making puff pastry, and a series of folds are performed. I've added a few pictures of the dough at various stages before and after rising to give you an indication on what to expect. Happy baking!
Pandoro - Italian Sweet Christmas Bread
dough quantity is for a 1 kg Pandoro mould
Spice mix
2 tbsp runny honey
2 tsp vanilla essence (or seeds of 1 vanilla pod)
zest of 2 lemons or oranges or a mix (finely grated)
For the lievito
5 g active dry yeast
60 g water at room temperature
15g sugar
50 g Manitoba flour
1 large egg yolk (ca 20g)
For the 1st dough
200 g Manitoba flour
1g active dry yeast
25 g sugar
30 g unsalted butter at room temperature
10 g water
1 large egg
For the 2nd dough
200 g Manitoba flour
100 g sugar
2 large eggs
5 g salt
To fold in
140g soft butter at room temperature
Prepare the spice mix: Mix the ingredients for the spice mix in a small bowl the day before baking and let stand at room temperature.
Make the lievito: In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine water, sugar and yeast and let stand for a few minutes until the yeast has bloomed. Add the flour and egg yolk and mix until well combined. This will be a very wet mixture (see picture on the left below). Cover with cling film and let rise at room temperature until doubled in size. For me, at 26C, it took 1 hour, but depending on how warm it is in your house, it could be 1-2 hours. It's ready when you see lots of little bubbles appear on the surface.
Make the first dough: To the lievito in the stand mixer bowl, add sugar, yeast and egg and mix on low speed until you've got a fairly even dough. Add flour little by little. After the flour is well incorporated, add the butter in small pieces, waiting for each piece to be incorporated. Knead on medium speed for a few more minutes until the dough is smooth (see picture on the right below). Cover the bowl again with cling film and let rise until doubled in size, about 2-3 hours, at 25 C, but watch the dough. Mine took less time because it was warmer in my house.
Make the second dough: Again, in the bowl of the stand mixer with the first dough, add flour, sugar and spice mix to the dough and start mixing at medium speed. Add the eggs, one after the other, waiting for them to be incorporated before adding the next. Once they are well incorporated into the dough, add the salt. Keep kneading the dough at medium speed until the gluten is well developed, about 15-20 minutes. The dough should be slightly sticky, but leave the bowl clean.
You want to avoid the dough getting too warm. If necessary, cover the bowl with cling film and put the dough in the fridge for 10 minutes before continuing to knead it to keep it at room temperature.
With oiled hands shape the dough into a ball and put it into a large, slightly oiled bowl. Cover with cling film and let rise until almost doubled in size, about 2 hours at 25C. Again, watch the dough! For me it took only 1.5 hours.
Once risen, knock back the dough, give it a few kneads by hand and shape into a ball again. Put it back in the bowl, cover with cling film and two tea towels and put it in the fridge to rise for 12-24 hours. (See pics below after having knocked back the second dough and once out of the fridge after 16 hours)
Fold in the butter: Take the dough out of the fridge and let it come up to room temperature, about 1 hour. Lightly flour a surface and your rolling pin and roll out the dough into a 30 x 30 cm square. Distribute butter in the middle of the dough and smooth it with a blunt knife or cake spatula. Leave about 5 cm on each side of the square unbuttered.
Now fold the corners into the middle so that the butter is covered and it looks like an envelope. Make sure that you press down the edges to seal in the butter and that the butter doesn't leak out. Now carefully roll it out into a larger square, about 40 x 40 cm again. Fold in half, cover in cling film and put in the fridge for 45 minutes to rest. Repeat this process another 3 times, 4 in total. Always start with rolling the dough out in a square, then an envelope fold and rolling it out again, then fold in half and back in the fridge.
After the round of folds, tuck in the edges and shape the dough into a tight ball and put it in the cake mould. I had to make a hole in the middle, which you would normally not do if you had a proper Pandoro mould. Let rise at room temperature until it reaches the top of the cake tin, maybe a bit higher. This should take anywhere between 8 - 12 hours. If your dough is rising too fast, put it in the fridge after the first few hours and let it rise in the fridge.
Bake: About an hour before the cake is proofed, preheat the oven to 170C. Butter your cake mould really, really well. If the dough was rising in the fridge, take it out of the fridge 30 to 60 minutes prior to baking to give it another boost in rising. Bake for 15 minutes, then lower the temperature to 160C and bake for another 30-40 minutes. Cover with aluminium foil half way through to prevent it from browning too much. It rises still significantly while baking, so I recommend baking it on the lowest shelf. The bread is done when the interior temperature reaches 90C.
Let cool for 5 minutes in the tin, then invert and let cool completely. It dries out easily, so I suggest to stick it in a zip lock bag or large Tupperware dish as soon as it is cool. Dust with icing sugar before serving. Enjoy!
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