The first thing to make panettone is to create the lievito madre (LM from now on 😉 ) and then what? Then we need to make sure the LM is ready, strong and not acidic before we mix the panettone dough. We achieve this by doing the bagnetto followed by the 3 preparatory refreshments.
To learn how to create a lievito madre from scratch check this post
Why do we need the bagnetto?
This technique is a way to purify, oxygenate and release of acidity the LM. It consists of a warm bath where we’ll put the LM for 30 minutes. Depending on its behavior, we can assess how our LM is doing. If it’s too acidic, if it’s too weak, or if it’s just good to go!
When do we do the bagnetto?
Only in two cases
- Before every maintenance refreshment
- Before the 3 preparatory refreshments for panettone
We shouldn’t overuse this technique because it will weaken our LM if we do it too often, as an exception, if you’re in the same situation as me, I built up my LM in 19-20 days instead of 15. If during those days you suddenly feel a change in your LM and you think it’s smelling much more acidic than the day before (if you can actually measure the acidity that would be even better), you can do a bagnetto, just make sure that you leave at least 2 days between this bagnetto and the bagnetto before the 3 refreshments.
How to do the bagnetto?
This is the procedure:
- Fill up a large bowl with water at 38C/100F (it must be 38C/100F)
- To the warm water add 2g of sugar per liter of water and stir until it’s completely dissolved.
- Proceed to remove the LM from the container, drain the water, remove the mushy part and squeeze very well.
- Place the LM in the water bath and leave it there 30 minutes
Depending on the state of our LM, three things can happen now:
- Your LM floats right away: you either didn’t squeeze it well to remove all the air trapped inside or your LM is too weak.
- Your LM floats after 5-10mins (or within the bagnetto time, mine floated has floated between 7 and 15 mins): it’s perfect. It’ll start showing only the tip and by the end of the bagnetto more of it will be out of the water.
- Your LM doesn’t float after 30 minutes: It’s too acidic, it doesn’t mean it’s weak, it means there is lots of bacterial and yeast activity.
Once the bagnetto is over, proceed with a refreshment the same way you’ve done before:
- 200 g of lievito madre
- 200 g of Manitoba flour
- 30-50% of the weight of flour in water
Mix the dough, roll it until it’s smooth and place it in a water bath for 12-14h
What worked for me was to do the bagnetto in the evening and let the LM ferment overnight. So, the next morning I started the 3 refreshments and started the primo impasto in the evening.
How to fix your lievito madre
There are several techniques but I’m going to focus on the simplest ones
LM too weak
- Leave in the water bath for 5-10 minutes
- Remove it from the water bath an do the 3 refreshments as if you were going to bake panettone
- After the last refreshment let the LM ferment for 12h and do a bagnetto again. At this point, your LM should work fine and float after several minutes.
- If you wish to make panettone, you can proceed now with the 3 refreshments again.
LM too acidic
Since there is a lot of activity, the LM needs more time to get rid of all the acid accumulated.
- Leave the LM in the water bath until it shows signs of wanting to float. After 45-50 minutes it should float.
My LM usually weights somewhere between 250-350g, I used the bowl of my kitchenaid (5qt) and fill it up with 3 liters of water. Since the bowl is not transparent, I can see how the water turns murky during those 30 minutes of bagnetto.
Why do we have to do 3 refreshments?
As I mentioned above, these three refreshments are to ensure that our panettone will 1) Triple in size after 12h of mixing the primo impasto and 2) the aroma and flavor will not be sour or acidic.
When we do the 3 refreshments, we’re also testing how strong our LM is. If it doesn’t triple in 3-4 hours, it means it’s not suitable for panettone. In that case, we can fix whatever the problem is before wasting ingredients.
Also, these 3 refreshments are going to help keep the bacteria happy and in line before they start releasing acids. So we reduce the acidity significantly.
Does it have to be exactly 3 refreshments?
Yes, not 2, not 4, but 3.
Why? Because experience tells us (or better yet… told Italian pasticceri) that 3 is the magic number. Doing less than 3 refreshments does not get rid of the sourness and more than 4 can affect the LM by overfeeding it.
I never thought about this until I started my research for panettone, but sourdough can overeat just like we can. And sometimes, feeding it more won’t make it stronger.
When I learned this, I realized that I did exactly that when I created my sourdough starter, I was feeding it too often and it got to a point where it was lethargic. The moment I reduced the feedings, it came back to life.
So, refreshing the LM more than 3 times might not give you the results you look for.
When do we do the 3 refreshments?
After the bagnetto we have to do one more refreshment, then let the LM ferment in water for 12-14h and then we will start with the first preparatory refreshment, after 3-4h we’ll do the second, after another 3-4h we’ll do the third refreshment and it’ll be ready to add to the first panettone dough after 12-15h.
A mature LM should triple in size in 3 to 4 h, if it does it before 3h something is wrong, it might be too active.
How do we do the 3 refreshments?
The method is the same as to any other refreshment:
- 200 g of lievito madre
- 200 g of Manitoba flour
- 30-50% of the weight of flour in water
After the bagnetto you need to squeeze the dough well and get rid of that slimy layer. Then proceed as any other refreshment: mix the dough, roll it several times, place it in your container and add the water. Then wait 12-14 hours, probably overnight. and refresh the LM again following the same method.
After 3-4h, proceed to do the 3rd refreshment and let it ferment for another 3-4h, then it’ll be ready to add to the dough.
If your house it’s too cold, you should carry out the three refreshments in a controlled environment, somewhere around 26-28C / 80-84F, otherwise, the LM might not grow enough in 3-4h
Refreshment schedule
7:45 am (12h after the bagnetto) take the dough out of the container, squeeze it well and proceed with refreshment #1:
- 200 g of lievito madre
- 200 g of Manitoba flour
- 30-50% of the weight of flour in water
8:15 am Roll the dough and place it in the water bath. Let the LM ferment 4h
12:15pm take the dough out of the container, squeeze it well and proceed with refreshment #2:
- 200 g of lievito madre
- 200 g of Manitoba flour
- 30-50% of the weight of flour in water
12:45 pm Roll the dough and place it in the water bath. Let the LM ferment 4h
4:45pm take the dough out of the container, squeeze it well and proceed with refreshment #3:
- 200 g of lievito madre
- 200 g of Manitoba flour
- 30-50% of the weight of flour in water
5:15 pm Roll the dough and place it in the water bath. Let the LM ferment 4h
9:15 pm PANETTONE TIME!
Take the dough out of the container, squeeze it well, weight the amount of LM you need to your recipe and cut it into small pieces before adding them to the dough to avoid having lumps of LM in the panettone dough.
What’s the best Panettone recipe?
You can use any panettone recipe that calls for lievito madre. The ratios might vary depending on the amounts of egg yolks, butter, sugar, fruits… But if you follow the instructions of the recipe you shouldn’t have a problem 🙂
If you don’t have a recipe I encourage you to try Iginio Massari, Rolando Morandin, Alfonso Pepe, or Ezio Marinato’s recipes. They are well known Italian pasticceri and their panettones are some of the best.
As always, you can reach me through email, Instagram, or Facebook. I’ll be more than happy to help you out!
Cheers to best panettones, enriched dough, laminated dough and bread that you’ll ever make!
Hi Maria,
I’m trying to make panettone but I’m hesitant to start. For the first two refreshments, my LM does great it rises in the water and grows within 3-4hrs. But on the third refreshment, it’s a lot slower. I was wondering if you’ve ever had this issue or if you have any ideas about what I could be doing wrong?
Hi Dana,
sorry for the delay, I never got a notification smh.
It has happened to me before! And when the third refreshment didn’t go as fast it usually meant the primo impasto never grew enough in the time it should. In my case, the LM was unbalanced, too much lactic acid. You can check my post on troubleshooting your LM, maybe my experience can be helpful!
this is the post: Troubleshooting my lievito madre
Good luck!
Hi, thank you for the amazing information. I am starting on the panettone journey and have attempted twice making the banetto and 3 refreshments but I never achieve a PH of 4.1. After reading your post, I believe my levain is weak as it floats right away in the water for the banetto. Also I forgot to squeeze the air out before dropping in the water. So I will try again with your suggestion. I do however have a question, do the 3 refreshments have to be in the water bath? I was under the impression you could leave in a basket wrapped in cloth after making a cross cut on top. Please help me understand better. thankyou
Hi Suzana! Before you do the bagnetto, you need to really squeeze the air out, it probably floated because it had lots of bubbles inside. The 3 refreshments don’t have to be in the water bath, you can do it outside. Typically, people who maintain their pasta madre wrapped in a cloth, also use the basket and cross on top method. And people who use the water bath, usually continues with it. But you can try the dry method for the 3 refreshments. I have tried it and both work well for me, provided your PM is in good health.
Also, the pH shouldn’t be the only parameter you pay attention to when it comes to pasta madre. Smell it, feel it, taste it… The pH is just another thing but not the only one. If overall, you don’t see it’s in good health, you might need to look at your process to see if there’s something you could improve.
Good luck!!
You really helped me with this content, it’s hard to find out about this kind of method, I wanted to know: you feed the weak levain in the firm texture and leave it in the water bath for 12 hours and then start feeding it 3 more times for 4 hours each, also in the water bath ? I don’t know if in translation something was lost, I’m from Brazil and had to use a translator, thank you!
dear Maria, thank you,
I have learned so much from you. what shell I do with leftovers of the LM after I used whatever I needed for my first panetone dough.
how do I preserve it for further uses.
Hello! You can use the leftovers to make bread, usually, when I’m just doing maintenance refreshments I use the discards to make a loaf for next day. If you have done the 3 preparatory refreshments you can use them to make enriched dough (brioche, babka…), but always make sure you reserve some to keep your LM going so you don’t run out of it. Usually, after the 1st preparatory refreshment, I take what I need to make the second and then I take about 100g of LM and feed it 200g of flour and 80g of water, I work it as usual and then I either wrap it or keep it in water and put it in the fridge. That way you only need to refresh every 7-10 days. Working with LM means generating a substantial amount of leftovers, so what I do is I keep then in a plastic container in the fridge and then use them to make crackers or grissini, I have used LM that had spent 2 weeks in the fridge (the leftovers) and it worked great for crackers. I used a lot of it and the dough rose overnight pretty well. For crackers, I don’t really care if the dough rises too much or not, because what I want is just a crispy cracker haha. I hope this can give you some ideas! 🙂
Hi Maria,
What’s the water bath temperature for the 3 refreshments for panettone, and do you keep it at 80-84F environment for 3-4hours?
On the article you wrote, If kitchen is cold, use room temperature water for the bath. What “room temperature” do you mean? My kitchen is around 64-66F, does it mean that’s the “room temperature”?
Hi Jess, the temperature of the bath will depend on what we’re doing. If it’s a maintenance refreshment, and your house is at 64-66F, you should be fine, and you can use room temperature water (if your house was at 75-80F, then you’d have a problem because your PM would be growing too fast and that’s not advisable for just maintenance. However, for the 3 preparatory refreshments, I use water at 80-86F, since the PM will be at a warm temperature, you can give it a kick start 😉