Merry Christmas! Every year at Christmas here in Italy people when they gather for dinner, whose main course varies, but for dessert we will eat either Pandoro (left) or Panettone (right) – they’re the heart of Italian Christmas, and causes for many wars!

43 comments

  8. I personally prefer panettone — but I’m surrounded by pandorians at home!

    Pandoro is original from Verona
    Panettone is original from Milan

    There’s always quite a bit of humour about the Pandoro Panettone conflict here in Italy, and everyone’s asked about their preferences during Christmas – even in university, with some of the professors with whom we have a more cold and distant relationship, during the last classes of December we break the ice and ask what they prefer and count the number of votes for either side – studying in Milan, most of my professors are 55-60 years old who were born and grew up all their life in Milan, for whom sushi is too exotic, so the votes are very lopsided in favour of panettone in that demographic lol

    Both have a very soft dough, but panettone’s is softer and it is slightly more dry, while pandoro is noticeably more sponge-y

    Both have as a base flour with high power naturally, eggs, butter and sugar – but the differences from there pop up. Pandoro uses whole eggs while panettone uses only the yolk or at best it’s a majority of only yolk eggs, with a minority of whole eggs.

    Pandoro is made with butter only on the first phase / step, in all the following steps cocoa butter is added instead and it will consist the majority of the two by the end of it. The flour is enriched with vanilla, honey, sometimes rum. The icing sugar on top is enriched with powdered cocoa butter and sometimes rum

    Panettone the surface is slightly burnt, it has a famous “variant” called veneziana. In the flour traditionally bits of candied oranges, candied lemons and raisins are added before the final oven, the dough can be enriched with peels of orange/lemon/whatever was added to the mix. There are variations like with chocolate bits instead of candied fruits and resists, which is often the one for kids. But the most common variant which at this point can be the second official recipe is the one where raisins and candied orange and lemon are all three substituted with dark chocolate and candied pear.

    The veneziana is this: [Picture of Veneziana variant](https://blog.giallozafferano.it/dulcisinforno/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/3484.jpg)

    The raisins are removed, but not the candied orange and lemon, and what’s added is not inside the dough itself but on the frosting on top: a frosting of almonds, but it’s done in a very different manner to what Americans are used to, and with whole almonds added on top of the frosting itself.

    Pandoro has a more delicate, “heavenly” aroma, with many delicates flavours that gets ruined/overshadowed if you add stuff, panettone has a more intense and rich taste, it can take a beating.

    As reminded by another commenter here, in my opinion supermarket Panettone kinda sucks, Pandoro supermarket is OK, but I have my known like three trustworthy pastries shop that makes good Panettones

    BTW, for Christmas Dinner there’s often zampone or cotechino as main course – but that’s postponed to new year’s eve dinner oftentimes, and I’ll make a new post for then talking about them 🙂

    Edit: for Christmas there’s people that eat torrone – a pastry shared with the Spaniards in history – in Campania also Struffoli and in Tuscany also the Panforte. And in Liguria the Pandolce. None of them are “the” aftermeal dessert like the Pandoro and Panettone! But they’re still Christmas food.

  9. I am from Slovenia so I’m used to eating Potica for Christmas and Easter, but I have relatives near the border with Italy. They bring us Panettone (bought in a store) as a gift every December. I love the candied fruit and raisins in Panettone, but wish the dough was a little less sweet. It smells divine though.

    I’ve never tried Pandoro, but the one pictured above is shaped kinda like traditional potica, but has no walnut/hazelnut fill or raisins.

  28. Made pandoro for the first time this year! It was really interesting to make it but still better to have both, maybe next year I’ll make both, who knows

  29. In France Panettone is sold for Christmas in lots of shops but it’s not really a tradition, just one of the things that the shops have at that time of year that is nice, but never Pandoro (never had it).

  30. Currently in Rome and ate Panettone Gentilini last night and IT WAS Amazing! Meraviglioso. Having made it before myself on more than one occasion and having tasted many commercially made types before…this was superior in every way!

  34. > they’re the heart of Italian Christmas, and causes for many wars!

    Will I get a nobel peace prize for saying that any sane-minded person would gladly eat both ?

    This debate seems way saner than the pain au chocolat/chocolatine in France, where, since it’s basically the same pastry, you can’t even pretend not to know the difference in order to get both.

  36. In Peru we eat Panettone every Christmas and new year, with hot chocolate(a lot of Italians came to Peru, back in the day). I have a question about this, should it not be called Pan-de-Toni? Like the guy who invented this bread was called Toni? Or is that just fake news?

  37. My dear italien friend, i’m a french so i am the master in term of gastronomy, food and cooking and i gonna tell you a thing :

    Pandoro for life !

    Ciao !

  40. In America Italian Americans eat panettone. Maybe some do, but I’ve never heard of it hear. It’s a tradition we brought with us from the old country.

  41. My local cheap ones have ***Palm Fat*** in it.

    The Italians have the best food and food processing machines.

    Do you guys have supermarket Panettones without Palm Fat ?

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