If you go into any reasonably-sized grocery store this time of year, you are guaranteed to find at least one panettone display. In the United States, they begin showing up on supermarket and specialty food market shelves toward the end of October and often stick around until mid-January–unless the store sells out. Online retailers also stock panettone in a variety of sizes.
If you’ve never had panettone, it is a delicious Italian sweet bread (or cake, depending on who you ask!) that seems to mark the Christmas season in the Western World. While the bread has roots as deep as the Roman Empire, the area around Milan in Northern Italy is often credited as the birthplace of this holiday treat.
Early on (around the 15th Century), panettone was considered a “celebration” or special occasion sweet because the ingredients were hard to come by. It was created in a time when wheat flour was a premium ingredient and the candied fruit would have traveled hundreds of miles by foot or wagon.
The panettone we know today–the commercial version you find in grocery stores–really hit the scene in the 1930s. Since then, the panettone’s popularity has grown through Europe, North America and South America. While it shares many of the same ingredients as a fruit cake, it somehow has escaped the bad rap.
Today it is not the rarity of ingredients that keeps people from making a panettone. It is the process that scares people. From start to finish, a panettone can take DAYS to make, depending on the recipe. Before you freak out and move on, this recipe is NOT one of those time-intense recipes. My version is only a few hours of commitment, and most of that time is inactive. (So you can get a holiday movie or two in while you bake!)
Time aside, one of the biggest changes to my recipe is that I have removed the fruit flavors and gone with chocolate instead. A chocolate panettone is not something I invented, but it is something I prefer to the traditional version. While the fruited version is really good, each year my Irish husband makes a whiskey-filled Irish fruit cake (he uses an entire bottle of Irish whiskey in it!) that is jam packed with the same fruits you find in panettone. Having fruit cake and fruit-filled panettone is just a little too much alcohol-soaked fruitiness for me. The chocolate breaks things up, plus it is more kid-friendly.
I admit that up until this year, I always went with the store-bought panettone, because I was intimidated by the multi-day process. However, now that I know how “quick” and easy it is to make homemade, I will never go back! I listed this recipe as “intermediate,” however don’t let that scare you. If you’ve ever made any kind of yeasted bread or roll, you are good to go.
Give chocolate chip panettone a try this holiday. Hopefully it will become a new family tradition. It is a lovely treat with coffee, tea or hot cocoa, plus the leftovers–if there are any–are great in bread pudding. That may need to be a future post, what do you think?
Chocolate Chip Panettone
Course: HolidayCuisine: ItalianDifficulty: Intermediate8
servings25
minutes55
minutes4
hoursItalian panettone has quickly become just as much an American holiday tradition as it has in Italy. This Christmas bread is typically filled with dried fruits and nuts that are sometimes alcohol-soaked–similar to an Irish fruitcake. The process to make panettone can take days depending on the recipe, but this version is so easy, it is ready to go in just a few hours. I prefer chocolate to fruit in my panettone, and mini chocolate chips provide a big enough flavor, but are small enough to nicely fold into the dough.
Ingredients
¾ cup whole milk (warmed to 110 degrees)
2 large eggs plus 2 large yolks
3 tablespoons light corn syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon almond extract
2 ¾ cups all-purpose flour, plus 1-2 tablespoons for kneading
1 package instant or rapid-rise yeast
1 teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 cup mini chocolate chips
1 teaspoon water
Cooking spray
Directions
- Whisk milk, 1 egg and 2 yolks, corn syrup, vanilla, and almond extract in 2-cup liquid measuring cup until combined. Using stand mixer fitted with dough hook, mix 2 ¾ cups flour, yeast, and salt on medium-low speed until combined, about 5 seconds. With mixer running, slowly add milk mixture and knead until cohesive dough forms and no dry flour remains, 3 to 5 minutes, scraping down bowl and dough hook as needed.
- With mixer running, add butter 1 tablespoon at a time until incorporated. Increase speed to medium-high and knead until dough pulls away from sides of bowl but still sticks to bottom, about 10 minutes. Reduce speed to low, add chocolate chips and knead until fully incorporated, about 2 minutes.
- Slowly sprinkle 1 tablespoon of flour into bowl as mixer is running to firm up the dough. It should pull from sides and bottom and begin to form a ball. If need, add up to 1 tablespoon more, but do not exceed 2 tablespoons total.
- With wet hands, remove dough from bowl and form dough into tight ball. Transfer to greased large bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and place in a COLD oven with the oven light on until doubled in size, about 2 hours.
- Spray a 6×4 panettone paper baking mold with cooking spray and place on a cookie sheet or in a cake pan. Pat dough into 12-inch disk on lightly floured counter. Working around circumference of dough, fold edges of dough toward center to form rough square. Flip dough over and, applying gentle pressure, move your hands in small circular motions to form dough into smooth, taut ball. Transfer ball, seam side down, to prepared pan. Cover loosely with greased plastic and return to COLD oven until center is about 2 inches above lip of pan, about 1 to 1½ hours.
- Remove dough from the oven, adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. While oven heats, lightly beat together remaining egg and 1 teaspoon water, remove plastic wrap and gently brush over dough. Bake until golden brown, 15 to 20 minutes.
- Rotate pan, tent with aluminum foil, and continue to bake until center of loaf registers 190 degrees, 40 to 50 minutes longer. Transfer to wire rack and let cool, about 3 hours. Serve and enjoy!
Notes
- Tip, if checking the internal temperature of the panettone, go through the side. That will keep your top pretty and from having a hole.
Adapted from a recipe by Cooks Country.
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