Fruit
-1/4 cup Grand Marnier
-1 cup candied fruit
-1/2 cup golden raisins
Starter
-3/4 cup warm milk
-2 tsp yeast
-1 1/2 cups flour
Dough
-1 tsp yeast
-3 eggs, room temperature
-2/3 cup sugar
-1 tsp salt
-3 1/2 cups flour (give or take)
-1 stick butter, cut into tablespoons
-1/4 cup pecans, broken into pieces
-1 egg, beaten
First macerate the fruit: mix the Grand Marnier, candied fruit and raisins and let stand in a small bowl.
Next prepare the starter. Soften the yeast in the milk. Mix the flour in until it is all well hydrated. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand until at least double (1 hour) or as long as 12 hours. Don't worry if it falls, all will be well.
Fruit and starter |
Make the dough. Strain the fruit and mix the Grand Marnier into the starter in the bowl of a mixer. Add the yeast and let it hydrate. Add the eggs, salt and sugar and start the mixer with the dough hook. Add the flour 1/2 cup at a time and let the mixer incorporate it. The dough will be quite stick and soft; don't be tempted to add too much flour. Let mix on medium speed for about 5 minutes and then begin incorporating the butter one or two tablespoons at a time. The dough will seem to fall apart, but keep mixing. You can add more flour a tablespoon at a time to bring it all together. Once the butter is incorporated, let it mix for another couple of minutes. Then add the fruit mixture and pecans. Continue mixing until it all comes together. Shape into a ball and place in a large bowl, covered with plastic wrap to rise.
Finished dough |
From there, I shaped it: I divided the dough in half and then make one big boule and four smaller ones. The big one, I put in a paper panettone liner that I had bought from a bake shop. (I used to just place it on a cookie sheet on parchment; this works fine if you don't have the paper.) The smaller ones I placed in a set of large muffin tins that I had sprayed with non-stick spray. (They rose so much I could have made them smaller and used all six muffin tins if I had wanted). Then I covered them with a towel and let them rise again, another 3+ hours.
I got up around 5:30 and heated the oven to 375. Once it was preheated, I cracked one egg, beat it and used it as a wash all over the tops of the by now well risen boules. I placed them in the middle of the oven and let them go. The smaller ones were done in about 30 minutes; you can tell by how brown they are on top. (You can also use an instant read thermometer to check for an internal temperature of 180 - 190 degrees.) The larger one took another 10 minutes. Here are the final results:
Finished loaves |
Yum! |
I was very happy with the final results. This proved to be a moist and relatively light bread.
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