Have you ever tried a store bought panettone?
Not good, right?
For a good panettone, you have to take matters into your own hands.
But what if you don’t have 3 days and the baking skills to tackle the real deal.
You know Bruno Albouz with the Real Deal channel?
Everyone loves watching the real deal, but not everyone loves making the real deal.
So I have a much, much easier alternative for you.
This sweet yeasted cake is not exactly a panetone, but it’s buttery and fluffy, and completely
irresistible with its crackling sugar crust.
It falls into the same category as all those festive breads that people love to bake around
Easter like panettone, brioche, and kulich.
And now, you can make one too!
I learned this recipe from Alina, who is a Ukrainian YouTube creator.
Alina’s recipes tend to be very easy and accessible for new cooks, but they taste outrageously
good.
What’s so cool about this bread is that it’s not only no-knead, it’s also no shape.
Since the dough is so wet, you mix it like a cake batter instead of kneading it like
bread dough.
You can do it in a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, with a handheld mixer, and even
with a spoon.
But this bread is not just no-knead, it’s no-shape.
If you’ve baked bread before, you are probably familiar with the challenge of shaping a good
loaf.
Well, this dough is so wet, that all you have to do is pour it into a pan, and spread it
out.
If you are a savvy baker, you are probably thinking “what’s the catch?”
If good enriched bread was this easy to make, why isn’t everyone doing it this way?
The catch is that this bread needs to be served straight out of the oven.
Once it cools off, the texture isn’t nearly as good.
But at the end of the video, I’ll give you reheating instructions for the leftovers.
Before you get started, make sure the eggs and butter are at room temperature.
If you forgot to get them out in advance, put the eggs into a bowl of hot tap water
for 5 minutes.
Slice the butter very thinly, spread it out on a plate and let it sit for about 15 minutes
to get to room temperature.
Put all the ingredients into your mixing bowl in the following order.
100g of warm whole milk at about 100F.
One and a half teaspoons of SAF instant yeast.
40 grams of sugar.
110 grams of eggs.
That’s about 2 extra large.
If your eggs are a bit smaller, you can compensate with a bit more milk.
50 grams of room temperature butter, thinly sliced, 1 tsp vanilla extract, 240 grams of
unbleached all-purpose flour (I am using the King Arthur brand), and 3 and a half grams
of salt.
That’s one and a quarter teaspoons of Diamond Crystal Kosher salt or just barely more than
a half teaspoon of table salt.
For all other salts use a high precision scale.
And finally, the zest of 1 orange or lemon, though that’s optional.
Fit your mixer with a paddle attachment and mix on medium-low speed until all the ingredients
come together.
Turn up the speed to medium and mix until and no more lumps of butter remain.
A hand mixer with stiff beaters would work very well too.
And I have even tried using a big wooden spoon and it still turned out well, just slightly
less fluffy.
Once the mixture is homogeneous, scrape down the bowl and beat this batter for 2 minutes.
Scrape down again and beat for 2 more minutes.
If you are using a hand mixer, you don’t need to scrape nearly as much.
If you are beating this mixture by hand, 4 minutes might be really tough on your arms,
so do what you can without killing yourself.
Scrape the batter into the center of the bowl, cover it with plastic and let it rise until
doubled.
This will take 1 to 2 hours depending on the temperature of your kitchen.
If you are new to working with yeast, you’ll have a really hard time judging when the dough
doubled in this huge bowl, so I suggest you move your dough to a quart measuring cup or
a similar container with straight sides.
This way you can easily mark where your dough started, so that you know when it doubles.
But if you have some intuition for yeast doughs, feel free to leave it in the mixer bowl to
avoid unnecessary dirty dishes.
While our dough is rising, let’s make the sugar topping.
Put 75 grams of sugar and 75 grams of room temperature butter cut up into small pieces
into a bowl.
Add 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract and a tiniest pinch of salt.
If you want, you can add cinnamon.
Based on the comments I am getting, that's a must-have in a dessert for many people.
Mush it all with a fork until combined and then refrigerate until needed.
Our dough has risen and we are ready to put it in the pan and proof it -- that’s the
final rise before baking.
Generously butter an 8 inch cake pan and while you are at it, butter a spatula as well.
Here is my dough before rising and here it is after rising.
I know it’s a little hard to tell in this big bowl, but the dough grew.
Give it a little mix to deflate it and pour into the cake pan.
Use your spatula to shove it into all the corners and smooth out the top, but don’t
drive yourself crazy.
It will all even out during rising.
Cover it with plastic and let it rise until roughly doubled.
This will take 30-60 minutes depending on your room temperature.
Once the dough gets close, preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Our dough got puffy again, and it’s ready to bake.
Dunk your finger in some neutral oil, like canola and poke a few holes in the dough.
Make sure you re-oil your finger after every hole or the dough will stick to you.
These holes will help the sugar mixture and later the cream penetrate the dough better.
Once the sugar butter mixture has chilled, it will be a lot easier to break it into little
clumps.
Sprinkle them all over the top of the dough and place the pan in the middle of the oven
for about 30 minutes or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.
Let’s see how our cake is doing.
That looks good.
Now the final step -- the cream soak.
This looks ridiculous and feels like you are about to ruin your lovely cake, but have no
fear.
The next step will make your cake wonderfully moist and delicious.
Oops, I forgot the holes.
Don’t pour the cream until you poke a bunch of holes in your cake with a skewer.
Slowly pour in 80 grams of heavy cream into those holes.
The hard part is not to ruin the crispy top, but if you pour slowly and wait for the cream
to absorb, you’ll be able to keep the top crispy.
Around the edges you can pour with no fear.
The cream will mix with the top sugar crust and form a caramel outside layer around your
cake.
Return the cake back to the oven for about 10 minutes.
If after 8 minutes of baking, some cream isn’t absorbed, poke that spot with a skewer and
give it another couple of minutes in the oven.
Let it cool for 3 to 5 minutes, but not longer.
Otherwise, you’ll have a hard time getting it out.
Run a spatula around the sides.
Put a plate on top.
Slide the pan off the counter
and flip it over.
Remove the pan and then use another plate to flip it back the crispy side up.
Cool for 10 minutes and serve.
Since it’s Easter, I thought we should serve it on a bunny plate.
Let me show you the texture.
It’s light as a cloud inside and crackly on the outside.
In case you have leftovers, the easiest way to rewarm them is to put a slice on a plate,
cover with a slightly damp paper towel, and put in a microwave for 10-20 seconds just
until warm.
I also want to give you an alternative rising schedule in case you want to make the dough
a day or two in advance.
This will be longer overall, but way less work the day of serving.
To make this work, reduce the yeast in the recipe from one and a half teaspoons to only
half a teaspoon.
Given the lower yeast quantity, your first rise will be 3 to 5 hours.
Stir to deflate the dough, and put it into an airtight container that’s about a quart
in size.
Now you can refrigerate it for 1 to 3 days.
On the day of baking, let the dough sit at room temperature for about an hour to soften,
and put it into the cake pan.
Proof for a couple of hours and proceed with the recipe as usual.
This makes your work on the serving day very easy.
Say you want to serve this cake for dessert after an Easter lunch.
You’d get the dough out of the fridge around 9am.
Pour into a pan at 10am.
It will finish proofing around noon, but since the amount of yeast is very small, it won’t
overproof nearly as easily as the original recipe giving you much more flexibility in
when to bake it.
Right as you are sitting down to lunch, your oven will free up from the other projects
and you can bake the cake.
Here are more culinary tutorials for you to check out and if you are ever in the Boston
area, maybe I’ll see you in one of my classes.