Sunvil Supper Club: Italian Panettone

First of all I want say a big  Merry Christmas to all my readers. I hope everyone has a brilliant day tomorrow, eats lots of amazing food and gets all sorts of lovely presents. Secondly, I'm sorry for not posting  yesterday,  I pretty much post every Sunday as a rule but Christmas kind of throws rules out of the window. We were at a wedding on Saturday, and yesterday we braved the supermarket to get the food shop and finally spent out nectar points. I think we must have been saving for about 18 months and finally decided to just spend them on Christmas. We made a last minute decision to have ham instead of chicken for our meal and I'm really excited to cook it with a honey and mustard glaze. 

I was also cleaning like a mad woman yesterday. I have this idea in my head that everything has to be immaculate for Christmas including new bed sheets. I don't want any mess until I've finished cooking. There were so many things I wanted to blog about in the run up to the holidays but I had to restrain myself. Some things can wait until after the big day but this is last officially Christmas recipe I want to give you before tomorrow. I was sent the recipe by Sunvil Supper Club and I agreed to take part immediately because I really wanted to make a panettone. I love that this blog gives me a great reason to try out different bakes that I wouldn't normally think of. I'm putting together a fraisier cake this afternoon to drop off to my Mum for her friend this Christmas. It's a mad day so far. 

Obviously this is different to the traditional panettone. I made it in a 23cm cake tin but it still tastes amazing. I love it because it's not as heavy as a traditional Christmas cake but it still has so much flavour. When we were in London earlier this month I really wanted to take armfuls of Carluccio's panettone home, but that might be more because I love the packaging so much. If you get chance later today or even next week whilst you're off, I'd really recommend you give this a try. Alternatively, Homemaker magazine posted my personal alternative Christmas cake recipe on their blog last week. They were amazing enough to mention me in their magazine this month and asked me for a Christmas recipe. I sent them one I'd come up with that's more in the line of a carrot cake and is less dry than some Christmas cakes. I'm really pleased with it and it's great because you don't have to make it 3 weeks in advance!

Italian Panettone

(recipe from Sunvil Supper Club)

2 1/2 teaspoons/1x 7g scahet dry yeast

240ml luekwarm milk

350g plain flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

115g unsalted butter, softened

2 egg yolks

150g sugar

3 tablespoons candied citrus peel

70g mixed raisins

1 pinch nutmeg

zest of 1 orange

zest of 1 lemon

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

for the glaze:

1 egg yolk

1 tablespoon of water

icing sugar, for dusting

1. In a bowl, sprinkle the yeast into the milk and let stand for 5 minutes, stir to dissolve. Mix the flour and salt in a large bowl, make a well in the middle and add the yeast mixture. Stir a little to make a soft paste but leave some flour round the sides of the bowl. Cover with a towel and let it sit for 20 minutes until the yeast mix is frothy and risen. Mix in the rest of the flour after 20 minutes to make a stiff dough. 
2. Knead in a stand mixer, or by hand on a floured surface, for 10 minutes. Then leave to rise for an hour in a covered bowl until it has doubled. Afterwards, punch down the dough and rest for 10 minutes. 
3. Grease a round, deep cake tin with softened butter. 20 or 23cm will be fine. Line the base and sides with greaseproof paper so that it extends 5 inches above the top. This will stop it from catching too much heat on the top.
4. Knead in the butter, egg yolks, sugar, citrus peel, raisins, nutmeg, lemon and orange zests and vanilla extract into the dough until thoroughly combined. The mix will be wet, like a cake mix but don't worry. Tip it into the prepared tin and smooth over the top. Cover with a teatowel and let rise for 2 hours.
5. Preheat the oven to 180 C. Brush the top with the egg glaze and bake for about 45 minutes (check after 35 with a cocktail stick if using a fan oven). Remove from the mould and let it sit in the greaseproof paper to cool on a wire rack. Dust with icing sugar to decorate. 

*Disclaimer: I was sent gift cards for the ingredients to the cake.

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