Milan’s Christmas Bread: Panettone

Fruitcake is a holiday tradition in many parts of the world, though it takes different shapes and goes by different names, and is far from being universally loved. The Italian version of fruitcake is panettone, and although it does contain the candied fruits that can make fruitcake something to avoid, its airy texture and lightly sweet flavor make it more appealing than other fruitcakes.

Traditional panettone is a light, sweet bread (yellow in color because it has butter and egg yolks in it) studded with raisins and the candied peels of lemons and oranges. It’s cooked in cylindrial papers, and when it rises it puffs out the top so that the end product looks like a muffin. While some fruitcake varieties incorporate alcohol into the recipe, panettone does not – but it goes quite well with a glass of sweet wine!

Panettone is more than just a Christmas bread, however, it’s also a good story – or up to three stories, depending on who you’re talking to. The legends behind the bread’s origin differ slightly, but all agree as to where it comes from – Milan. While the Ancient Romans were known to make sweetened bread, the origins of this particular recipe don’t go back quite that far.

The most commonly-quoted legend behind panettone says that in the 15th century, a man fell in love with the daughter of a baker called Toni. In order to win her heart and prove his love to her father, he came up with a bread recipe that included dried and candied fruits, and called his creation “pane de Toni,” or Toni’s bread. Another story says the Christmas banquet given by the Sforza family had no dessert until a young kitchen hand baked up a sweet bread, thereby saving the meal – and yes, the kitchen hand’s name was Toni.

Whether there is any truth to these legends is immaterial – the bread remains a part of the Christmas season in many Italian households, and for that we can be thankful.

Although panettone comes from Milan, it is now found throughout Italy leading up to Christmas – look in any Italian bakery window and you’ll see brightly-colored packages wrapping that shop’s panettone, ready for sale. You’ll even find mass-produced panettone in shops around the world, although the quality of these isn’t great. If you’re not in Italy and don’t have access to a good Italian bakery, you’re probably better off making your own panettone – especially since you can control for exactly what goes into it.

In my house, my husband is the panettone maker, and he adapted a recipe he found to omit the candied fruits that neither of us like. Instead, he uses raisins, dried cranberries, and toasted pine nuts. Making your own panettone gives you the liberty to include whatever fruits and nuts you like – including candied fruits if that’s your thing. Make extra loaves to give away – they make excellent holiday gifts. You can find the traditional papers that are used to bake panettone in specialty kitchen shops like Sur la Table or online (here’s a variety of sizes on Amazon). If you’re planning to give them as gifts, you may want to seek out smaller baking papers so that you’re not stuck in the kitchen making multiple full-sized loaves.

Oh, and here’s a tip for serving panettone – every photograph you’ll see shows panettone being sliced into wedges as if it’s a cake. And it certainly is cake-like, and can be served for dessert. In my house, however, it’s a favorite breakfast bread, and it’s especially good when it’s been lightly toasted and buttered. Slicing a round loaf isn’t always elegant, but if you turn it on its side and slice from the bottom up, you’ll be able to get more evenly-shaped slices.

Enjoy it fresh with a sweet wine after dinner, and the next morning have a toasted slice with your coffee. Panettone may be Italian Christmas bread, but it’s so delicious you may find excuses to bake it all year long.

Visitor’s Information: What to Know if You Want to Go
As mentioned, you can get panettone all over Italy now, not just Milan – and, in fact, it’s even reported that it’s slightly more popular in the south than in the north these days – but to visit the city where it all started, you’ve got to head to Italy’s banking and fashion capital.

Milan’s Malpensa Airport is Italy’s second busiest (after Rome), and although it’s not the capital city nor on most tourist must-see lists it’s often easier to find cheap flights to Milan than it is to find deals on tickets to Rome. Milan’s status as the country’s banking and business center may have something to do with that, but it’s not uncommon for tourists to be unhappy about being forced to fly in and out through a city they wouldn’t normally have on their itinerary. The good news is that Milan is well-connected to just about anywhere else you’d want to go, in Italy and elsewhere in Europe, via its major train hub and multiple airports.

You can see the main attractions in Milan in a well-organized 24 hours, so if you do get a flight in or out of Milan it’s worth making an effort to see a few things in the city. The iconic cathedral, Milan’s Duomo, is at the very center of the historic city and it offers visitors the cool opportunity to walk around on the roof. On one side of the square in front of the cathedral is the Galleria, a precursor to modern shopping malls, and walking out the back of the Galleria you’ll see one of the other famous Milan landmarks – La Scala opera house.

Perhaps the most famous tourist sight in Milan is Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” fresco – visitors are strictly regulated in order to control for humidity (the fresco is in a very fragile state), so if you’d like to see it you’ll need to book your ticket well in advance (it sometimes sells out months ahead) or reserve a spot on a city tour that includes the fresco.

And while you can’t make a pilgrimage to the bakery where panettone was first created, you can get your own Christmas bread if you’re visiting during November or December.

photos by Nicola since 1972, ben hanbury, Giorgio Montersino, Italy Chronicles Photos