First Dough – 1k of panettone

Now it’s time to make your first dough. By this point in the process, your madre will have been proofing for 4 hours at 28 degrees celsius. Once you’ve trimmed your madre, you will be able to mix in your other ingredients to make your first dough.

Note:

In this step, the order in which you add your ingredients is very important as it can affect the structure of your panettone. Start with the liquid, mix for a few minutes, then add the dry to create the gluten, once the gluten is formed you can add the butter. You want to keep the dough at 26-27 degrees so keep checking the temperature. If the temperature goes up too high, the butter ends up melting too much (the melting point is 26 degrees celsius). Keep mixer speed slow and constant. You can smush the butter in your hand so that it is smoother and absorbs into the dough quickly.

Equipment:

• Sharp knife
• Chopping board
• Digital scales
• Stand mixer
• Bowl or container for first dough

Ingredients:

• 750g strong panettone flour
• 200g caster sugar
• 180g unsalted butter – 16-18 degrees celsius and 84% butter fat (tip: butter has different levels of fat, the more water in the butter the less quality, we recommend Lescure)
• 475g water – 4-8 degrees celsius
• 15g non-diastatic malt syrup
• 220g 3^rd refreshment of internal madre (i.e., crusts cut off)
• 130g free-range organic egg yolks – cold from fridge 4-6 degrees celsius

Instructions:

1. Using a sharp knife, trim any hardened madre (discard) as you did during the refreshments so that you’re left with only soft, pliable madre. Weigh out 220g of madre and keep any excess for maintenance or for discard recipes.
2. In your stand mixer, add egg yolks, sugar, and malt syrup and 80% of the water. Mix the ingredients slowly for around 2-3 minutes. Add the dry ingredients: flour and madre. You can divide the madre with your hands to make it easier to incorporate. Mix for 14-17 minutes until the dough reaches the DDT of 26-28 degrees.
3. Adding the butter is the most important stage of the panettone. The gluten must be formed and strong for the butter to be added. You can perform the windowpane test to check the strength of the gluten. With the mixer still running, add the butter a little at a time. Note that with a kitchen aid/smaller hook, needs to be on a faster setting to form the gluten. Once all the butter is combined, check the temperature and check the gluten has formed properly by taking a small piece of dough and doing the windowpane test. Take a piece of dough and, using both hands, stretch it. The dough should become thin enough to see light through it without tearing.
4. Take the container or bowl in which the dough will rest overnight and lightly coat the inside with butter. Take the dough out of the mixer and, on your work surface, push down on the dough with the heel of your hand, then take the far end of your dough and fold it over onto the rest of the dough. Rotate the dough 90 degrees and repeat these steps. Then tuck the edges of the dough under so that the dough is smooth on top. Place in your container or bowl smooth side up. If you want, you can track the growth of your dough by marking the bowl either with a marker on the outside of the bowl or an elastic band.
5. Leave overnight room temperature – return to the main schedule.