Do you remember the disaster of my colomba morta? I didn't want to waist food again so to be on the save said I have chosen for my second attempt a recipe with yeast, to be precise this recipe from Petras Brotkasten. I did changed it slightly and you know what the dough did rise like hell, no wonder there is a lot of yeast in it. ;-)

But also this time there is a little defect. Just look at the picture and you can see it.

Does this look like a colomba? No! For me it looks like a bee.

The colomba looks more like a bee than a dove. I think this comes from my homemade mold. It's quite difficult to get here Panettone and colomba molds, so I did one by myself. I bought a 24 cm round aluminum mold and tried to give it a dove shape. Probably there was something wrong on the head part, so during baking the neck of my dove collapsed and finally looked like a wanna-bee colomba. ;-)

A really good instruction how to shape your own colomba mold can be found on Lien's Blog.

This wanna-bee colomba is my submission to Cinzia's Happy Baking Easter.

Colomba
makes 2 colombas or 1 colomba and 9 muffins *

Preferment
60 g flour
40 g water
25 g fresh yeast

Dough
540 g flour
1/2 tb gluten (optional)
140 g lukewarm milk
2 eggs
1 egg yolk
100 g soft butter in small pieces
100 g sugar
zest of 1 lemon
1/2 ts salt
1 pack vanilla sugar

Final dough
40 g soft butter in small pieces
100 g chopped candied orange

Glaze
75 g sugar
25 g whole peeled almonds
1 tb lemon zest
1 egg white
10 whole unblanched almonds
sliced almonds
coarse sugar
powdered sugar

The evening before baking mix all the ingredients of the preferment and knead until you get a firm dough. Cover and let rise for about 3 1/2 hours. Before you go to bed add the flour, eggs and egg yolk, 100 g butter, lemon zest, salt and vanilla sugar to the preferment and knead on speed 1.5 (Bosch MUM 8) for 4 minutes then on speed 2 (Bosch MUM 8) another 8 minutes until you get a soft dough. Put the dough in a oiled big bowl cover and let rise overnight at room temperature. If you prefer to prepare the dough earlier you can do so and store the dough in the fridge, remove from the fridge before you go to bed.

Next morning you need to knead the dough again, add butter in pieces and mix on speed 2 (Bosch MUM 8) until the butter is incorporated, finally add the candied orange.

Divide dough in 4 equal pieces, then divide 2 of them again in 2 equal pieces (wings) form in rounds and let rest for 10 minutes. Form two bodies and 4 wings and place in molds.

Cover and let rise for about 2 hours, they should double or even triple in size.

Preheat oven to 180 C.

Glaze and Baking: Finely mince sugar with peeled almond and lemon zest. Add egg white and mix well you should get a thick batter. Spread very gently over risen dove. Sprinkle with the whole and sliced almonds as well as with the coarse sugar. Finally cover with a lot of powdered sugar and bake for 45 minutes in the middle of the oven. If the glaze turns to dark cover with aluminum foil.

*I made just one colomba and with the rest of the dough I made some muffins.

***

I know this is not the real colomba, the real one has to be made with sourdough. Nevertheless its taste is good and it's airy and fluffy.

Y. loves it, me too especially the glaze.

Happy Easter to everyone!