Panettone
Ingredients
Instructions
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To make the starter: combine the flour, yeast and water in a medium bowl. Cover and leave the ingredients to do their thing. This will take about 10-12 hours. In the morning, you should see a bubbly little brew.
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To make the dough: add the starter, flour, water, eggs, butter, vanilla, yeast and salt. Using your stand mixer, knead the dough using your dough hook. The dough is going to be loose, but add a little more flour if it just looks too loose, so it comes into a loose ball.
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Cover and let this mixture rise for a couple of hours. If it's like mine, it won't rise a whole lot--for me, it more "relaxed" than rose, although it did rise a little.
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Gently deflate the dough and add the almonds, cherries, apricots and cranberries. Knead these ingredients in using your hands until fully incorporated.
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Place the ball of dough into the panettone form (I got mine from Amazon) and let it rise to the top of the paper form. I have no idea how long to tell you how long this will take. For me, it took about 4-5 hours and it still didn't reach the top of the form.
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When you figure you've had enough of waiting for the rise to finish, start preheating your oven to 400* When the oven is fully pre-heated, place the panettone onto a baking sheet and carefully place the whole thing in the oven. Bake for 10 minutes on 400, then decrease the temperature to 375*. Bake at 375* for another 10 minutes, then lower the oven temperature to 350* and bake for another 20-25 minutes until the internal temperature of the loaf is 190*. I recommend placing foil on top of the loaf once you decrease the temperature to 350*, else it will brown too much.
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Remove from the oven and let it cool a bit before slicing out a piece. Spread a little butter on it and take a deep breath--this will be a spiritual experience, my friends!
