Panettone is an enriched bread that I've played with over time. This year I got the strange notion to try a white trash version in a brown paper lunch bag. Not because I wanted to make fun of a grand sweet bread, but I didn't have molds and my dough needed a place to proof and bake! I got a half way decent version with natural leavening, but I think the texture (more like a cake crumb) had some issues with a slow ferment and the white trash bag having not enough insulation. The bottoms certainly got a bit darker then I wanted!
So I went back to the drawing board with a tested formula I'd used and got molds, the real ones! And alas a decent airy panettone fit for the season!
Hi Jeremy
The panettone look great. My attempt was a bit of disaster this year. I was using stone ground white flour which didn’t give the required texture and I misplaced the raisins (later found in the deeper recesses of my bike pannier) so I had to use some old currants and I also got the portions for each mold wrong so it didn’t rise to the top…but I made a zucotto by lining a basin with the “panettone” and softening it with Vin Santo and filling up with 2 different flavoured ricotta layers and putting on a final layer of panettone.
Ben
Hi Ben! Sounds like an adventure in baking for sure! Zuccotto idea is great. Panettone are a once a year tradition for me, though I’d like to play around with it in a different way,flour, flavor fruit!