Italian Easter cheese bread recipe
This luscious Italian Easter cheese bread has soft crumbs with an indulgent cheese aroma. A true pleasure for your nose and palate. Serve it with cured meats, cheese, and boiled eggs as Italian do for Easter breakfast. Also, It is a great all year round recipe, made as an appetizer with salami or for pic-nics.
Servings: 6 people
Calories: 767kcal
Equipment
- Medium oven tray
- Stand Mixer
- 1 paper baking mould of Panettone for 1kg
- 1 Medium Bowl
- 1 Small bowl
- 1 Fork and spoon
- Stand Mixer
- dough hook
Ingredients
Biga
- 100 gr strong bread flour 13% protein
- 70 gr water room temperature
- 8 gr fresh yeast cold from the fridge
Easter cheese bread
- 400 gr strong bread flour 13% protein
- 100 gr whole milk cold from the fridge
- 100 gr Parmigiano Reggiano grated
- 130 gr Pecorino Romano grated
- 60 gr olive oil extra virgin
- 60 gr lard take it out from the fridge 5 minutes before starting
- 4 medium eggs room temperature
- 10 gr Maldon salt
- ½ teaspoon ground black peppercorn
- ½ teaspoon nutmeg grated
- 100 gr Gruyere cheese cut it into small cubes
Instructions
Make the biga
- Dissolve the yeast into the water in a small bowl. Add the flour and mix until you have a smooth dough. It should be slightly sticky, don’t add more flour to it. The biga will helps the dough to rise as it is quite heavy.
- Cover the bowl and leave it to rise for two hours in the oven at 26°c. The biga should more than double in size.
Make the batter
- Add the Parmigiano Reggiano, Pecorino Romano, eggs, olive oil, lard, milk, salt, nutmeg and black pepercorn into a medium bowl. Mix with a fork until combined, cover it and set aside.
Make the dough
- Add 5 spoons of the flour, 5 spoons of the batter, and the biga in pieces into the bowl of the stand food mixture. Knead for a few minutes at low speed using a dough hook.
- In two stages add the rest of the batter and flour at intervals. Knead until you have a smooth dough at speed 1.
- Tip the dough onto a worktop and knead for a few minutes. No need to add any flour as the dough is not sticky. Widen the dough, helping with your hands, and add the Gruyere cheese in 3 stages. Knead the dough every time you add the cheese. Knead until the cheese is combined.
- Shape the dough into a ball shape using your hands. Place the dough inside the paper baking mould. Cover it and leave it to rise in the oven, turned off*, for 6/7 hours at 26°c. The dough should rise until it reaches 2 cm from the edges. In case it has not risen for the given time just give it some more time to rise.
Bake the dough
- Preheat the oven to 180°c; 160°c fans; 350°c or 4 gas mark once the dough has risen.
- Place your paper baking mould with your dough in a baking tray and bake it for 50/60 minutes, always check as every oven is differents. The Easter bread will be ready once each will have a nice brown colour. To double-check, place a toothpick inside the bread, if ready it should come out dry.
- Let it cool down before serve.
Notes
All recipes are developed and tested in Metric grams. I strongly recommend using digital scales for a more accurate result.
*Turned off- to achieve the right temperature use a cooking thermometer. I have the one from Ikea, and it works great. Leave the metal probe inside and turn the oven at 100°c for 8 seconds until it reaches 23°c, then turn it off. Check every now and then the temperature and adjust it accordingly, however, don’t let the temperature be over 30°c. Alternately leave the light of the oven on.
I don’t have fresh yeast; can I use dry active yeast instead?
Yes, of course. However, I didn’t try it myself but I would use around 5 gr of the dry active yeast. To active the yeast follows the basic guide of the label, however, use the same amount of the water that the recipe says.
I don’t own a stand food mixer, can be done by hand?
Yes, of course. Add the biga and the flour into a big bowl, then add half a dose of the batter into it and mix with a fork. Then add the rest of the batter and mix again until you have a compact dough. Tip the dough onto a worktop and knead the dough until will become smooth. From here follow the recipe above.
How to store Italian Easter bread?
Once cooled off, store it in a paper bag for 3 days. Otherwise, you could freeze it. Cut it into slices and store them individually inside the freezer bags. Store them for up to 2 months.
I don’t have a paper baking mould for panettone, what can I use instead?
You could use a cake tin with Ø18 x h 12 cm, just remember to spread some butter inside the tin cake before laying the dough. Or use any Panettone cake tins for 1 kg of dough.
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