Soft pandoro with sourdough

In the days before, refresh the sourdough starter once a day;

On the day you decide to start the pandoro, carry out three refreshments, for example

9:00 first refreshment

13:00 second refreshment

17:00 third refreshment

21:00 first dough

First dough

In the bowl of the stand mixer fitted with the dough hook, mix the flour with the sourdough starter in small pieces and two-thirds of the eggs. Knead until the dough becomes nice and shiny and smooth (windowpane stage: the gluten network has formed and the dough comes away from the sides of the bowl), add the rest of the eggs and let the dough strengthen again, then add the sugar a little at a time, the salt and only then the cold butter straight from the fridge, a little at a time. Knead well until the butter is fully absorbed. Be careful not to knead too much, otherwise the dough will heat up and you risk breaking the gluten network… let us say the whole process should last 30 minutes at most.

Leave to rise at 28°C (a switched-off oven with the light on is generally enough) until it triples in volume; it will take on average about 12 hours, but even more.

Second dough

After this time, once you have checked that the dough has tripled, go on to the second dough.

Deflate the risen first dough and chill it for 15 minutes in the freezer, covered with cling film.

Then put it into the bowl of the stand mixer, add the flour and the malt and knead until completely absorbed and you have a nice shiny, elastic dough. Only at this point add the salt and the yolks, a few at a time. Then add the milk and the butter and let them absorb. Finally add the emulsion prepared beforehand by whipping the butter well with the icing sugar, the honey, the grated cocoa butter and the seeds of the vanilla pod.

Leave the dough to rest at 28°C for about 30 minutes, then divide it into two pieces of equal weight, greasing your hands with butter, and give a first shaping (roll it into a kind of round loaf… the dough is soft, it feels almost like handling a fior di latte mozzarella).

Place the pieces on buttered oven trays and leave to rest at 28°C for about an hour.

Meanwhile butter two aluminium pandoro moulds.

After this time, shape the dough again by rolling it on itself to get a nice spherical ball, and place the balls in the buttered moulds.

Leave to rise at 28°C until the dough reaches the rim of the mould… it will take at least 5 or 6 hours, but maybe even more.

Bake in a static oven at 170°C for about 50 minutes, taking care to put a small pot of boiling water in the oven to create steam.

Take out of the oven when the pandoro has a core temperature of about 93°C, measured with a kitchen thermometer.

Leave to cool in the mould and, after an hour, unmould and let it dry.

Sprinkle with vanilla icing sugar.

…I will not explain how to store it because I know you will eat it straight away.

To enjoy it even more, before putting on the icing sugar hold it near a heat source for 5 minutes.