Each panettone bake is an experiment in a number of methods. This one was a trial of a chocolate panettone recipe which intrigued me due to its components.
First, it makes use of cocoa powder, somewhat than a ganache. That is simpler and less expensive than the cocoa mass-based strategy, and likewise lighter. Second, it’s fairly excessive in egg yolks in comparison with most recipes. I puzzled how this could have an effect on the crumb; definitely the images have been encouraging.
I discovered the recipe to be correct and fairly workable. The dough dealt with nicely, and the one downside I had was a spot within the directions round the usage of water within the second dough. Nothing main although, and mixing went nicely. My starter was in fine condition, as I had taken it out of storage 3 days earlier to feed it each day.
The primary impasto rose 4X in slightly below 12 hours, and the pH was 4.78 at completion.
The ultimate rise solely took 3.5 hours, however I attempted to stretch it out a bit longer. The dough was scaled at 1020g in a 1 kg mould.
I’m fairly proud of the end result. The loaves rose dramatically, and have a light-weight and shreddy crumb. The chocolate taste shouldn’t be too pronounced, however it enhances the plentiful inclusions (white, milk and darkish chocolate). I glazed the loaves, and located that this recipe is delicate sufficient to require turning the loaves periodically to keep away from splitting on the aspect away from the convection fan. The unique recipe was achieved with no glaze, and used the scalpare strategy. This permits growth vertically, the place we would like it.
However this acquired me desirous about how this panettone differed from my very own recipe and others I continuously bake. Whereas the excessive yolk content material favors plasticity and a excessive rise, it comes at the price of some discount in tenderness, and a barely drier crumb general. This was despite a dough texture that dealt with very nicely, was moist sufficient to ferment very nicely, and had sufficient sugar saturation, salt and so on.
Ternary Evaluation
Whereas I’ve primarily targeted on sugar management, mixing approach and hydration beforehand, I wished to look at a few of the key ingredient relationships that change considerably between recipes. To do that, I’ve began to make use of ternary plots to assist me perceive the “candy spot” of enrichment. Disclaimer: I began out as a programmer, so that is additionally enjoyable for me to do!
Within the case of this current bake, it appeared to me that the quantity and kind of enrichment relative to the quantity of flour within the recipe was too “excessive” to allow easy doming throughout the bake. I’ve a few preliminary plots which bear out my expertise.
The ternary plot permits you to have a look at three parts at a time, and evaluate a number of datasets (recipes) to contemplate the variations. Initially, I checked out flour, butter and yolks in 4 recipes I’m accustomed to.
Unsurprisingly, all 4 recipes are in a reasonably small cluster. Nonetheless, zooming in we see this:
The brand new recipe (Lily) is skewed towards the yolk nook, as anticipated. Roy’s recipe, notoriously decrease in yolks and better in butter, can also be comparatively greater in flour relative to enrichment. A recipe attributed to Bernardi on-line is greater in each yolks and flour. My very own recipe is extra central with yolks and butter and a bit decrease in flour.
All of those recipes produce outcomes according to this evaluation. Modifications to hydration throughout the mixing course of can change the crumb considerably, however panettone does normally keep in a managed vary of hydration.
I’ve various different ternary plots in improvement, that ought to shed extra mild on the method. For now, I’ve a couple of insights to use to my very own bakes and extra programming to do! (As an illustration, grey wasn’t one of the best colour coding choice)..
Additionally of curiosity, right here’s an Excel radar chart of Elements as a % of dough weight (with out inclusions):
