Panettone

I love panettone - but didn't want to spend over a tenner on one - it seemed pretty straightforward to make, so surely worth a go. Last year I tried a recipe I found on the web, but it wasn't great: bit too dry, not the right balance of fruit and sugar. So when I saw a recipe in the River Cafe's Classic Italian Cookbook - bingo. If Mrs' Rogers and Gray have approved it - I'm in.
They didn't disappoint - it was sensible and delightful all at the same time. Plenty of proving time, plenty of eggs, plenty of fruit, not too much sugar.
I like it best (almost) when its proving - it looks glossy, light and rich.
When baked - my slightly-too-hot-oven nearly got the better of it - but i rescued it in time, and it was really good when cooled.
Being a bread it needs to settle and cool before eating - unlike cake :)
I'll stick with this recipe from now on.

Panettone bread and butter pudding

Ok - so this is related to this: Night Bakery

There was too much bread product for Matt and I to manage, so I wanted to find a way to not let it go to waste. On Monday night we had the bath buns pretending to be savoury bread - with soup. It worked very well. Let them eat Brioche...
But the panettone I wanted to use properly - so made up a custard and made bread and butter pudding with it.
Its fantastic. The smell from the kitchen was superb. The custard set really nicely and the bread was light with good flavour. At last it found its millieu.

Night bakery

I wanted to try a panettone. After some research on the web, I selected what I thought was a sensible recipe, and gave it a go - wondering how i'd get that amazing panettone taste. And - sorry to disappoint - but I'm still wondering.
I made a very nice fruited bread - but its a bit too airy, bit too dry - though its got 5 egg yolks in it!!
On reflection, (sitting here munching it) it just needs more fruit and candied peel, and slightly (3 mins?) less time in the oven to sort the dryness. Easy enough to fix.

I also knocked up some more Bath Buns - they're a bit popular.

All this bakery takes a huge amount of hours tho'. I'd started at around 4pm - got these done, (and the choux buns and my dinner,) through the night til 1am, when the buns were done, then set the alarm for 5am to get the proved panettone in the oven. Set the alarm again for 40 minutes later to pull it out of the oven.
Then get my ass down to work for a cafe day. I thought of it as conditioning training. This bakery shizzle isn't for the wussy hearted.