Panettone (pan-eh-TOE-nay) is a tall, domed Christmas bread from Milan, rich with eggs and butter and studded with raisins and candied citrus. In much of Latin America it’s called panetón and comes in a box to every Christmas Eve table, from Venezuela and Colombia to Peru. The real Italian loaf takes a sourdough starter and two or three days of work. This home version swaps the starter for a tablespoon of instant yeast and fits into one afternoon, or two short sessions if you let the dough sleep in the fridge. What you get is softer and more like a fruit brioche, and it’s reliable in a regular home oven on the first try.
What homemade panettone tastes like, and what it won’t do
How do you make panettone without a sourdough starter? Knead 450 g (3½ cups) of bread flour with instant yeast, eggs, yolks, warm milk and sugar, then work in 130 g (9 tbsp) of butter a little at a time until the dough passes the windowpane test, and let it double. Fold in soaked fruit, split it between two paper molds, let it rise to ¾ in (2 cm) below the rim and bake at 350°F (175°C) until the center reads 197°F (92°C). Hang upside down to cool. 325 minutes for 16 servings.
What changes without a starter. A bakery panettone is built from several doughs fermented over days, with far more butter and yolk than this one. That long fermentation gives the shreddy, cotton-candy crumb, the faint tang, and a shelf life of weeks. With commercial yeast and a single dough you get a tender crumb that tastes of butter and orange, slices neatly, and stays fresh about 5 days. If you want an exact copy of the imported boxed loaf, this isn’t it. If you want a fresh one with fruit you actually like, it is.
Time and effort. 325 minutes on the clock, about 45 of them hands-on. Medium difficulty: nothing tricky, but the kneading and the rises can’t be rushed.
Ingredients by weight, with US and UK swaps
Bake by weight if you can: enriched doughs are fussy about flour, and cup measures of flour vary a lot depending on how you fill them. The batch makes about 1,160 g (2½ lb) of dough, enough for two 500 g loaves.
| Ingredient | Metric | US | Swap and what it changes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bread flour | 450 g | 3½ cups | All-purpose works, but the loaf rises less and the crumb is tighter |
| Instant yeast | 9 g | 1 level tbsp | Active dry: same amount, dissolved in the warm milk for 10 minutes first. Fresh: 27 g (1 oz) |
| Sugar | 90 g | 7 tbsp | Don’t cut it much: it keeps the crumb tender |
| Eggs + yolks | 2 + 3 | 2 + 3 | Large eggs, at room temperature |
| Whole milk | 110 ml | scant ½ cup | Keep it at 95–104°F (35–40°C); around 140°F (60°C) yeast dies |
| Unsalted butter | 140 g | 10 tbsp | Salted butter works; skip ¼ tsp of the salt |
| Candied fruit | 120 g | 4¼ oz | Dried cranberries, chopped dried apricots or candied orange peel alone, same weight |
| Raisins | 80 g | ½ cup | Golden raisins or currants |
| Rum or orange juice | 45 ml | 3 tbsp | Juice for a kid-friendly, alcohol-free loaf |
Chocolate chip panettone. Replace all the fruit with 150 g (1 cup) of chocolate chips and skip the soak. In Peru this version is sold as chocotón.
Candied fruit in the US and UK. In the US, tubs of diced candied fruit and candied citron show up in supermarket baking aisles before the holidays. In the UK, mixed peel and glacé cherries sit with the baking dried fruit all year.
The mold, and what to use instead
A paper panettone mold bakes the loaf, holds it upright and doubles as its gift wrapping. The 500 g size is about 5¼ in (13 cm) wide and 3¾ in (9.5 cm) tall, and you’ll find them at baking supply stores and online. Alternatives:
- One 1 kg (2 lb) paper mold for a single tall loaf with all the dough. Bake 50 to 60 minutes and start checking the center at 50.
- A 6 in (15 cm) round metal cake pan, or an ovenproof 1½ qt (1.5 l) saucepan with no plastic handle, for each half of the dough. Line it with parchment that stands about 2 in (5 cm) above the rim, so the dough has a collar to climb.
An instant-read thermometer is the one tool worth buying for this bread: the crust browns long before the center is baked.
A make-ahead plan for Christmas Eve or New Year’s
Bake panettone two or three days before you serve it. It has to cool for hours, and it slices more cleanly the next day.
| When | What you do | Hands-on |
|---|---|---|
| 2 days before, evening | Soak the fruit, knead, refrigerate the dough | 30 minutes |
| 1 day before, morning | Fold in fruit, shape, second rise (often 3 hours or more from cold), bake, hang | 15 minutes plus oven |
| 1 day before, night | Bag the cooled loaves | 5 minutes |
| Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve | Slice and serve at room temperature | none |
Doing it all in one day? Start before noon: the two rises and the bake add up to about 5½ hours before cooling.
Feeding a crowd. One batch gives 16 slices. For 30 people, make two separate batches rather than doubling in one bowl, unless your mixer is large: a home stand mixer kneads a double load of stiff, buttery dough poorly.
Rise times by kitchen temperature
The times above assume a kitchen at 75–80°F (24–27°C). Yeast slows down in the cold and speeds up in the heat, so judge by volume, not the clock.
- Cool kitchen, below 72°F (22°C), normal in a UK or northern US winter. Expect it to take noticeably longer. Put the bowl in the switched-off oven with the light on, or next to a pot of hot water.
- Warm kitchen, 75–80°F (24–27°C). First rise 1½ to 2 hours, second rise 1½ to 2½.
- Hot kitchen, 82°F (28°C) or more. Fast rises: check after the first hour. The bigger risk is the butter melting during kneading. If the dough turns greasy and slack, chill it for 15 minutes and carry on.
The first rise is done when the dough has doubled and a floured fingertip leaves a dent that springs back slowly. The second is done when the dome is ¾ in (2 cm) below the rim. Past the rim means overproofed, and it may sink in the oven.
The windowpane test
The butter goes in late because fat gets in the way of gluten. Let the dough build strength with the eggs and milk first, then feed it the butter.
It will be sticky at first. Don’t add flour; keep kneading. It’s ready when it cleans the sides of the bowl, looks glossy, and a walnut-sized piece stretches into a thin, see-through sheet without tearing. If it rips straight away, give it a couple more minutes and test again. By hand it takes 15 to 20 minutes after the butter, slapping and folding the dough on the counter with a bench scraper.
Why panettone hangs upside down
Straight from the oven the crumb is so soft that the dome sags under its own weight. Hung upside down, gravity pulls the other way while it sets. This yeasted dough is firmer than a sourdough panettone, so it’s less likely to collapse, but I hang it every time.
Push both skewers through the paper and the bread as soon as it comes out, about ¾ in (2 cm) above the base, and rest the ends across two chairs, two tall stockpots or the open top of a cardboard box, with the dome hanging free. Leave it until completely cool, at least 4 hours or overnight. Baked in a metal pan, let it cool in the pan on a rack and unmold it cold; the top may settle a little.
Troubleshooting
- The dough didn’t rise. Old yeast, milk that was too hot, or a cold kitchen. Check the date, the milk temperature, and give it more time somewhere warm.
- Dense and squat. Underkneaded (no windowpane), low-protein flour, or a second rise cut short of the ¾ in (2 cm) mark.
- Sank while cooling. It wasn’t hung, or it rose over the rim before baking.
- Burnt top, raw middle. Oven too hot or no foil. Stay at 350°F (175°C), tent at 20 minutes and go by the thermometer.
- Fruit sinks or tears the dough. It went in wet or too early. Dry it, flour it, and add it after the first rise.
- Stale in two days. It was stored in the fridge or left open.
Allergens. Contains wheat (gluten), egg and milk. The rum is optional.
Storing, freezing and giving it as a gift
- Room temperature. Once cool, keep it in a sealed plastic bag or airtight tin for 5 days. Slice only what you need and press the bag against the cut side.
- Not the fridge. Bread goes stale faster in the fridge than on the counter.
- Freezer. Whole or in wrapped slices for up to 3 months. Thaw in the bag at room temperature, then warm a slice for 10 to 15 seconds in the microwave or toast it.
- As a gift. Wait until it’s completely cool, or trapped steam will soften the crust. Leave it in its paper mold, slide it into a cellophane bag, tie it, and add a tag with the date and whether it contains rum.
The butter costs the most in this recipe, followed by the candied fruit; using more raisins and less candied fruit brings the cost down.
How to serve panettone
Cut it into wedges about ¾ in (2 cm) thick and serve it plain, with butter, or with coffee. In Peru it comes with hot chocolate, and a mug of Colombian hot chocolate works the same way. On a Venezuelan Christmas table it sits next to ponche crema, Venezuelan ham bread and black cake soaked in rum. Stale slices make good Venezuelan bread pudding. In January, the Mexican Three Kings bread uses almost the same buttery dough.
Panettone questions
Can I bake one big panettone instead of two? Yes. Use a 1 kg (2 lb) mold with all the dough and bake 50 to 60 minutes at 350°F (175°C), tented with foil once it browns, until the center reads 197°F (92°C).
Is this the same as Chilean pan de Pascua? No. Chilean pan de Pascua is eaten at Christmas too, but it’s a dense, spiced cake rather than a yeast bread.
How far ahead of Christmas can I bake it? It stays fresh for five days in a sealed bag, so baking it up to four days ahead is fine. For more lead time, freeze it well wrapped and thaw it the day before.
Nutrition per serving
Per serving (one eighth of a 500 g loaf, about 2½ oz / 70 g), worked out ingredient by ingredient from the recipe card, with the rum drained off:
- Calories: 253 kcal
- Protein: 5 g
- Carbohydrates: 37 g, including 15 g sugars
- Fat: 9 g, of which 5 g saturated
- Fiber: 1 g
- Sodium: 169 mg
About a quarter of the calories come from the butter.
I always bake both loaves, even when we’re only a few at home, because one stays and the other leaves wrapped in its own paper mold, which is half the gift already. And I hang them even though this dough could probably cope without it. It’s one minute with two skewers, and the dome stays round. Josnaisis.