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12 Loaves of Panettone --> Ankarsrum

evandy's picture
evandy

12 Loaves of Panettone --> Ankarsrum

I feel like I need to make up lyrics for "The 12 Days of Christmas" ending with 12 loaves of panettone...

Because that's what killed my KA-Pro 600.   Not that I noticed at first... but a month later, it starts dripping metal shavings into the bowl.  I've put in an order for a brand-new Ankarsrum to replace it.   Everyone's (many, many) posts make me certain that I'll (eventually) learn to make great bread with it.

What I can't find anywhere are any good list of things to learn (or unlearn) while adjusting to it.  The best I've found is "add the liquid first" which is easy enough.  What else do I need to know that's not in the (scattered) videos and blog posts?

12 panettone; 11 monkey breads; 10 dinner rolls; 9 loaves of brioche; ... 5 french bageuttes; 4 braided challah; 3 whole wheat boules; 2 sandwich loaves; and a kitchen-aid mixer that broke.

MichaelLily's picture
MichaelLily

The only tips I have for that mixer are: dry ingredients first, and use the roller/scraper and never the hook.

not sure why you heard liquid first? That's a planetary thing.

I just made panettone in the Assistent. Very pleased with the mixing process.

evandy's picture
evandy

How does the roller do on working in the butter?  That's the one thing that seems like it might be challenging given the way the roller & scraper work.

What formula do you use for your Panettone?  I've been fairly happy with Rose's recipe in her bread bible to date, though I've tried a few others.

MichaelLily's picture
MichaelLily

I used soft butter and did a brisee, and then let it do its work until it was incorporated. Worked great today. Tbh I have had difficulties in the past while making brioche. But that was more of a me error than a machine error. I move the arm around a bit to pick up pieces straying in the middle, especially when working a very small quantity.

I am making my first panettone right now. Following Iginio Massari's "modern panettone" recipe. I used the one relayed by Michael Wilson on a thread from 2012 on this site. I was inspired after eating a From Roy panettone last week. Transcendent.

RoundhayBaker's picture
RoundhayBaker

..of course. I made three dozen panettone (30kg total in seven batches) with a new Anskarsrum in the run up to Christmas and faced the same question. After a bit of trail-and-error, I found that using very, very soft butter cut up then pushed evenly into the surface of the dough worked very well. Butter around the perimeter lubricates the bowl spectacularly, but takes a long time to work in. Ditto with the dough if you place it around the roller.

We also made 2kg batches of mini-panettones in a KitchenAid Artisan. Obviously, these smaller batches mixed and kneaded more quickly but there was no difference between the two in the end product. 

MichaelLily's picture
MichaelLily

Now that you put it in words, that's exactly what I did with the butter yesterday. Bit by bit right on the dough.

gary.turner's picture
gary.turner

Liquids should go first in nearly, if not all mixers. Dry first is a hand mixed thing, where liquid is slowly added and integrated into the flour etc.

gary

DaveTC's picture
DaveTC

I have had my Ankarsrum for a week now, so I have plenty to learn.  I am glad that I made the purchase.

I still have a KitchenAid Artisan that has been going strong, but I never used it for kneading much.  I just did the rough mix and then finished the dough by hand.

The new mixer was easy to learn.  The roller and scraper are the only attachments used so far.  I found the same recommendation of adding liquids first and it works well.  I plan to continue that practice.  To me, it is like a motorized hand tool and you make things up as you go along.

I haven't tried butter yet.  The one thing that I saw a couple of people doing wrong (in my opinion) during demo videos was to not increase the gap between the roller and bowl as the bread gets stiffer.  I think this adjust-ability to different dough conditions is the strength of the Ankarsrum.  

The one think that it was not very friendly more was trying to add water to a dough that was too stiff.  I felt that I was working on a pottery wheel with the outside of the dough slick.   I finally was able to trap the dough between the roller and the bowl to begin the kneading action.  A KitchenAid would have had problems also.    I have started working with higher hydration dough, so the Ankarsrum is not a huge asset over other mixers when doing stretch and folds.

 

gary.turner's picture
gary.turner

A, maybe the, key thing is to set the roller gap and speed appropriate to the amount and stiffness of the dough.  There is a chart in the manual that provides a good starting point.  I adjust according to how the kneading is going.  If the roller is slapping against its stops, you're some combination of too fast or too close.

The roller needs only be close enough to press the roller's scallops fully into the dough and no more.  You're not rolling out pastry.  Ease the speed up until it begins slapping, then back off a bit.

For butter, I use two methods, depending. For cold, hard butter, I scatter pats over the flour and cut them in as you would for flaky pie dough or biscuits. If the butter is already soft, I heat it a bit and pour it into the other liquids and run at high speed with the roller on the rim until well incorporated.  Then, reset the gap and lower the speed to dead slow for initial mixing. You can simply add the soft butter to the liquids without regard to premixing.   Just slowly add the dry ingredients and mix until incorporated.

There's a lot of info in the manual that doesn't get clear until you've become familiar with the machine.  They need a really good technical writer to make things more user friendly.

gary

jaywillie's picture
jaywillie

I am also coverting to an Ankarsrum -- about six months now. I tried the "liquid first" method but found it made absolutely no difference in the kneading or anything else about the mix, and especially not in the final product. I know there are a few videos online that use that method, but no one ever explains the reasons behind the notion. I tried both ways a few times and made my own decision. Now I put all ingredients in at one time and start it up, just like I do with my KitchenAid. Works for me.

jaywillie

evandy's picture
evandy

Given some of the comments above, I wonder if it's mainly because of the trouble you'll have in adding water to a formed dough with too low hydration?   So much easier to add flour than water...

Though with a good scale, it's hardly as big of an issue.

evandy's picture
evandy

The Ankarsrum arrived earlier this week, and I managed to find time to give it a spin today.  Successfully made 2 dozen bagels (in one knead!) and a pair of 1lb loaves of beer bread.   Everything seemed to go well, and I got a great windowpane on the bagels.  Much quieter than my KA was, so quite happy with it thus far.

After watching dozens of different videos, I was disappointed that I didn’t get “the donut” when mixing.   Both doughs formed a ball, which went around, got stuck on the scraper for a while, then went around again.    They seemed to knead fine, but based on the videos I was expecting to see a nice ring of dough.   Does anyone know if this is due to any mis-adjustment on my part (e.g. roller position), or just due to the hydration percentage of the specific doughs that I was working with?

gary.turner's picture
gary.turner

I have only ever got the donut with wet doughs. In my opinion, the donut is not developing the gluten nearly as well as the ball you mention.  Even when the ball is hanging on the scraper, there's a lot going on.  Look closely, you'll see the base of that ball is being twisted.  When it hangs on between the scraper and the roller, it is being pulled and twisted; sort of like pulling taffy. Then it releases and is squeezed by the roller as you might squeeze with your fingers. After going through the roller it is grabbed and turned by the scrapper and 'round and 'round it goes.

When the scraper grabs the ball, start paying attention.  That's a good sign the gluten is coming together.

gary

evandy's picture
evandy

I was wondering if it was a wet-dough thing...

I certainly did notice the stretching / twisting even with the ball.  And, as I said, got a great window-pane on the bagels so I'm not too worried...   just not what all the various instructions led me to expect.

gary.turner's picture
gary.turner

I'd say a majority of DLX videos are by people sharing their ignorance.  My response, all too often, is "what the hell is s/he doing?"  That's not to say that there aren't some good vids, but until you are more experienced with this wonderful machine, you won't know which are the real deal and which are blowing smoke.

As a general rule from me, a Real Deal ;-P, be gentle.  The DLX is naturally a gentle machine that is very efficient.  Don't force it.  You'll quickly find the sweet spot for your baking and your doughs.

gary

evandy's picture
evandy

For those coming along later looking for answers...

I've now completed 6 lbs of bread (3 2-lb batches), 24 bagels (in a single mix!), and a batch of brownies with the cookie loops.

1) The Ankarsrum definitely handles large batches nicely with the roller.   It turned out 24 window-pane bagels (Berenbaum's "Levy's Bagels" recipe) with ease.  I'll be trying Reinheart's recipe next time around, which is a drier stiffer dough.

2) Don't trust the you-tube videos.  I have yet to get "the donut" but the dough is mixing very well.  Ankarsrum themselves state that the ring only forms with wet doughs.  With more normal doughs I get a dough-ball that runs around the mixer.  Depending on the size of the ball; adjust the roller and speed so that it gets "hung up" on the dough scraper, causing turning and stretching as noted above.

3) One of my batches was 2lb of Brioche.   I had to turn the speed up higher than I expected to get good mixing when it was time to work in the butter, but it did the job VERY well.  The dough was strong enough to form a ball (despite being wet), and often hit the scraper, stuck, and got wound around it.   Great windowpane.   I DID soften the butter in the microwave so that it was very soft.