Ricotta bread with pistachios and orange

Bomboloni are traditional Italian donuts filled with different creams like pastry cream and Nutella. The whole process is in my YouTube video so check it out for a complete class on the procedure!

INGREDIENTS

• 400g + 100g Unbleached all purpose flour
• 10g Active dry yeast
• 33g Sugar
• 14g Kosher salt
• 12g Vanilla paste or extract
• 80g + 60g Water, room temperature
• 80g Whole or 2% milk
• 150g Ricotta cheese (good quality!)
• 55g Butter, unsalted
• 7g Orange zest (about one full orange)
• 3g Orange extract
• 150g Pistachios, roasted, salted

The first thing you need to do is make a preferment, however if you don’t have time for this, you can always skip it and make the recipe as a straight-dough. To make the preferment, simply combine in a bowl the 60g, the 100g of flour and a tiny pinch of yeast. Kneed with your hand until you form a ball. Cover with plastic wrap and let it ferment for 12-14 hours. Basically you would do this before you go to bed on Saturday to make early Sunday morning…
If you don’t want to make the preferment, simply follow the steps below and just add those quantities of flour and water to the other quantities. So it will be 500g of flour and 140g of water total.
The next morning or after at least after 12 hours have past, start making the actual dough.
If your yeast is the regular active dry yeast that you get in the supermarket, you are going to have to rehydrate it. For this, place the water and milk with a pinch of salt in your mixing bowl and sprinkle the yeast over it. Give it a little mix and wait 8-10 minutes until you see it is very foamy. If it hasn’t produced bubbles after 12 minutes, it means your yeast is dead and you need to throw it away.

Once the yeast is active, you can add all the wet ingredients on top of the yeast, meaning on the bottom of the bowl and then finish with the dry ingredients meaning flour and salt.
The only ingredients that you will leave on the side will be the butter and the pistachios.
Mix everything first with the paddle attachment until it comes together. Then switch to the hook attachment.
Mix it for 2-3 minutes until a nice dough has formed, you can then add the butter in small pieces making sure you don’t add the next piece until the previous one has incorporated into the dough. The butter should be cool to the touch but not too cold.
If the dough begins to stick to the sides and bottom of the bowl, simply stop the machine and scrape down the sides and bottom with a flexible bench scraper or spatula. Continue to mix until all the butter has incorporated.
The dough might look like it won’t come together at the beginning but it will, just be a little patient. Refer to my YouTube video on “Bomboloni” to see this procedure.
Once the dough has formed a ball, transfer to a flat surface to kneed for a few minutes just to finish the mixing process by hand. Spray some cooking spray to your surface instead of flour so it doesn’t stick and you don’t add unnecessary extra flour to your dough.
Spray some more cooking spray inside a bowl and place the dough in it. Give a quick spray on top of the dough and cover with plastic wrap. If possible, let it ferment in the oven (turned OFF) with a pot with steamed water. If you are able do this, then leave a little opening on the plastic wrap. If your oven is not available, then simply cover with the plastic, a towel and place on the warmest part of your house.

Let it ferment for one hour. Then remove from the bowl onto a flat surface with some cooking spray, pat down and add the pistachios, which have been previously chopped. Kneed the dough to incorporate them well. Some of them might fall but just place them wherever you can, they’ll stay in as the dough rises again.
Let the dough rise for another hour.
Remove from the bowl onto a flat surface with some cooking spray and divide the dough into three 200g pieces and three 163g pieces.
I liked to make one free standing braid with the larger pieces and one loaf with the smallest braid but you can decide if to put it in molds or not.
Roll each piece to about 35cm or 14” in length. Make the two braids and place the large one on a sheet tray lined with parchment paper or a silicone mat. Place the smaller braid in a 11cm x 24 cm or 4 ¼” x 10” or a similar measurement.
Let them proof for about 1.5 hours.
Preheat the oven at 375ºF or 191ºC.
Bake the smaller braid for 25 min and the large one for 30 min. Let them cool completely before cutting.

This bread is amazing the day it is baked, however it is to die for sliced, toasted and drizzled with honey the following days.

Ricotta bread with pistachios and orange

INGREDIENTS

PROCEDURE

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