Delicious Italian Easter bread , Pane di Pasqua is brioche like rich bread with orange zest, orange juice, anise seed and colorful dyed eggs.
You will be wondering why I am posting Easter bread after Easter. It was to complete this month Daring Baker’s challenge, which was to make Easter bread, suggested by Wolf of wolf’s den. I was planning to make Easter bread for a long time, but never got around to it. Finally I was able to make this beautiful Italian Easter bread-Pane di pasqua.
It all started because my daughter’s school also wanted two hard boiled eggs for coloring the eggs. So thought why not I make few colored eggs for my Easter bread too. I boiled 5 eggs to make hard boiled eggs for coloring; unfortunately only two were able to come out in good shape, while others started cracking while in the water. I boiled a few more eggs, to get intact shelled hard boiled eggs. I usually make hard boiled eggs by adding salt to boiling water. How do you make it?
I get good success with this method, occasionally get some cracking. Since I don’t care much about shell it is not a problem. But for coloring the eggs I need some perfect hard boiled eggs. Also my princess wants to color the eggs with her favorite color blue. I made blue, red, green, yellow and green color to make various colored eggs. I used Wilton gel food coloring to make the eggs.
First you need to make dyed eggs
Even though for the Italian Easter bread recipe I don’t need a hard boiled eggs, only they color the raw eggs and eggs gets cooked while baking. I was hesitant to use raw eggs for coloring.
Boiled eggs in the evening and put it in colored water for overnight in refrigerator and next morning I started to make the bread.
How to make Italian Easter bread, Pane di Pascua ?
I read that traditional Sicilian Easter bread dough consists of orange zest and anise seed. I always forget to use the orange juice after zesting the orange, so this time I also added orange juice to bread dough. I can’t waste my orange as it is grown in my backyard. This bread has brioche kind of dough and rich with butter and eggs. It is really easy to make dough, just mix flour, butter, sugar, eggs, orange juice, orange zest, yeast, anise seed and milk.
Traditional Italian Easter bread is made as braids with colored eggs pushed it into dough. I made it as individual rings, like I saw here, which doesn’t require pushing it into dough. After first fermentation divide the dough into single ropes and twist them to form braids and set aside for another rise.
Once the dough is raised and ready to bake, place the colored eggs in the center and do the egg wash on the dough and sprinkle with sprinkles. Italian Easter bread is more colorful and summery than the Greek Easter bread. The later consists of red colored eggs which resemble the blood of Jesus. May be next time I will make Greek Easter bread.
Along with this I also tried Norwegian decorative Easter bread, which turned good but decoration was really bad. So my reality was far from the expectation. I will try those too as the bread is so tasty.
For the time being I am happy with Italian Easter bread, here comes the recipe.
Italian Easter Bread- Pane di pasqua
Ingredients
- 3 cup +1 tablespoon/355g All purpose flour
- 3 ½ tablespoon /42g of granulated sugar
- 1 package Rapid Rise instant yeast (about 2-¼ teaspoons)/7g
- ½ teaspoon/3g of salt
- ⅔ cup /178g of milk
- 3 ½ tablespoon/ 49g of butter
- 2 eggs beaten
- 2 tablespoon of orange juice
- ½ teaspoon of Anise seeds
- Zest of one orange
- 1 egg beaten with 1 teaspoon of water for egg wash
- 4 dyed Easter eggs I Used hard boiled eggs, you can skip that by using raw eggs
- sprinkles or pearl sugar
For coloring the eggs
- 4 Hard boiled eggs
- Red green, yellow and Blue wilton food gel coloring
- 4 tablespoon of vinegar
- 4 cups of boiled water
Instructions
For coloring the eggs
- In a 4 disposable cups and fill with 1 cup of boiling water on each. Using a toothpick, dissolve Wilton Gel Food Color or Icing Color until water is your desired hue.
- Stir until completely dissolved.
- Add 1 tablespoon white vinegar to colored water; stir.
- Using a spoon, add hard-cooked egg to water. Let set until egg is desired shade. ( I kept in refrigerator for overnight)
- Remove egg from water using spoon. Let dry.
Make the dough
- In a microwave safe bowl, warm the milk for 30 seconds. In a bowl of kitchen aid mixer, and flour, salt, sugar, yeast , orange zest, orange juice and eggs. Add the warm milk and butter. Mix well to form a smooth dough. At first it will sticky, then after kneading for 5-6 minutes it will become smooth supple dough. Place in a greased bowl, cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about two and half hour.( my kitchen is cold, make sure to check timing on double it may varies depending upon your kitchen temperature)
- Punch dough down, divide into 8 pieces of about 84.37 grams each. Roll each piece to form a 1 inch thick rope about 14 inches long and, taking two pieces, twist to form a "braid", pinching the ends, and loop into a circle.
- Place on a baking sheets lined with parchment paper or Silpats. Cover and let rise until double, about 45 minutes again. Brush the dough with beaten egg wash.
- Put on the sprinkles or pearl sugar. In the middle of each bread ring, gently place an Easter egg, making an indentation with the egg.
- Bake at 350 degrees until golden - about 28 minutes. Cool on rack.
- Discard the eggs don't eat.
Notes
Nutrition
This is Swathi ( Dr. Ambujom Saraswathy Ph.D) from Zesty South Indian Kitchen who loves to explore cuisines from all over the world. Whenever possible I try to to give an Indian touch to several of the world cuisine, and has weakness for freshly baked bread. All the recipes you see here are created by me and approved after taste-test by my family.
Kayla says
In the recipe in never said when to add the orange juice. I guess I should have added in with all the other ingredients but it just said orange zest. Also, why would you discard the eggs? They can be eaten if you make sure they are cooked all the way through.
Swathi says
Eggs cooked in too high heat make it rubbery for me, you can use if you want
Sona says
wow..this is soo soo soo pretty and colourful. better late than never..glad that i saw the post.
Suja Manoj says
Wow great job Swathi,adipoli aayitundu
Reeni says
What beautiful Easter breads Swathi! We usually make them every year but skipped this year and I'm sorry I did. I really missed them seeing yours. They are a real treat. We add dried fruit to ours like citron or the kind you put in fruitcake that comes in the little plastic tubs.
Shweta says
Appreciate the detailing of this post and what a lovely looking colorful bread. Too good
April @ The 21st Century Housewife says
Your Easter Breads are gorgeous, Swathi! They look so delicious and colourful.
julie says
very cute one and looks very delicious bread 🙂
Bekkah @ OhMySweetiePie says
These are so festive! They look amazing
Anu'skitchendelights says
Amazing recipe. Loved the colorful eggs...merry to my eyes. Bookmarked.
Agos says
Great work! I love how colorful it is.
Rekha says
What a wonderful Easter bread. It looks gorgeous Swathi 🙂
kaveri says
Awesome looking bread Swathi...loved the colorful eggs in the middle
jaspinder kaur says
Looks so tempting. perfectly made..wowww
nayana says
Mindblowing bread n fantastic presentation
smitha says
wow !! wat beauty.. well made n explained too
Mythreyi says
Wow, what a true labor of Love! Lovely Presentation of Easter Eggs in Basket!
-Mythreyi
Yum! Yum! Yum! - Coffee Grinder GiveAway
Savitha says
I can see your hard work in this post Swathi. Loved the basket and the coloured eggs.
Christy says
Oh, this looks AMAZING! And you can see the effort you've put into it!!
Pam Capone says
Beautiful bread, what a fantastic Easter treat
Priya says
colorful bread...perfectly made.Would like to make them sometime
gayathri says
Easter bread looks so cute, yummy and colorful. well explained with lots of picture.
Catherine says
Your Easter bread looks beautiful. Blessings, Catherine
Sony's kitchen says
Bread looks Fabulous...... Nice and colorful 🙂
easyfoodsmith says
The bread looks amazing Swathi. Your tutorials reflect how much effort you put in each of your posts and also your passion. Great job.
bhawya says
Looks so tempting.. Neatly explained 🙂
Gloria says
Looks so delish.. I wish I had seen this before easter.. Will try this soon..