How Roy Shvartzapel is revolutionizing

panettone
By Carolyn Jung Nov. 7, 2016 Updated: Nov. 7, 2016 4:58 p.m.
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Sous chefs Lindsey Cameron (left) and Mary Ann Chou flank Roy Shvartzapel as they
check on the panettone.
Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle
 In the world of baking, panettone is the Mount Everest of endeavors.

Brazenly buttery, studded with dried fruit and blessed with an ethereal texture, the Italian
Christmas bread has produced a precipice of untold awe, anxiety and failure in many a pastry
chef attempting it.

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Roy Shvartzapel of Oakland, though, has not only scaled that formidable challenge, but done so
in rapid fashion.

A classically trained pastry chef who has worked at elBulli in Spain, Bouchon Bakery in Beverly
Hills, and Pierre Hermé in Paris, he started his Richmond baking company, Panettone From Roy,
last December. Relying only on social media and industry word of mouth, he sold 500 of his
commanding 8-inch tall, 2¾-pound panettones over 10 days on his website. For a lofty $50 each.

This December, he expects to sell 5,000.

His is not just a mission to create perfect panettone, but also to popularize it for every occasion
— without even having a brick-and-mortar outpost. It’s an audacious notion, he admits, one that
nobody else has dared to attempt.

“The first time I tried one at Pierre Hermé in 2005, it was transcendent,’’ says Shvartzapel, 39,
who remembers it being the most stressful product made by that legendary patisserie. “I had
never put a baked good in my mouth that I couldn’t explain. Imagine the most delicious brioche
you ever had, and then imagine that on steroids. It was rich yet light. How was that even
possible?
Chef Roy Shvartzapel makes a test batch of apple-cranberry panettone topped with
cinnamon streusel with sous chefs Lindsey Cameron (left) and Mary Ann Chou.
Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

“I started thinking about how we don’t eat pie just in November,” he continues. “So why can’t
panettone be a vessel for different flavors like pie and be sold 12 months a year?’’

To that end, he now sells it online year-round throughout the United States and Canada in
nontraditional flavors such as pistachio-cherry and banana-orange-caramel. This Thanksgiving,
he will bake versions like apple-cranberry and caramel-pecan, in a nod to classic apple and pecan
pies. For Christmas, there will be traditional candied orange-raisin panettone, along with his best
seller, chocolate, laden with dark Guittard.

He’s now expanding beyond his own website, too. This holiday season, the panettone also will
be available in limited quantities through Williams-Sonoma online. Blue Bottle stores will soon
sell it regularly, and it’s on the shelves at the Shed in Healdsburg. In October, Mozza2Go in Los
Angeles, the takeout outpost owned by Mario Batali, Joe Bastianich and Nancy Silverton, started
selling them. With takeout pizza the bulk of the business, Mozza2Go sells only a few other select
items. Silverton, a former panettone-maker herself at her original La Brea Bakery, knew she
wanted to carry Shvartzapel’s from the first taste.

“I don’t think I ever would have gotten the texture he got,’’ Silverton says. “His is the lightest,
most flavorful and richest panettone I’ve ever had.’’

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1of 21Chocolate panettone (left) and cherry, white chocolate and pistachio panettone with
almond glaze and pearl sugar by chef Roy Shvartzapel.Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle
2of 21Chef Roy Shvartzapel with panettone just out of the oven on Thursday, October 20, 2016,
in Richmond, Calif.Photo: Liz Hafalia / The Chronicle
 3of 21Chef Roy Shvartzapel checks the temperature of panettone just out of the oven.Photo: Liz
Hafalia, The Chronicle
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This summer, San Francisco’s Del Popolo became the only restaurant in the country offering it
by the slice ($11) on its dessert menu. Del Popolo owner Jon Darsky became a fan after ordering
two panettones last Christmas, only to mistakenly receive four of them. Shvartzapel, in a panic
because supplies were so limited, ended up rendezvousing with Darsky on the freeway to
retrieve the extra two. They’ve been fast friends ever since, bonding over their passion for
naturally fermented doughs.

“When I’m at the counter making pizza, I just tell people ‘You are stupid if you don’t order
this,’’’ says Darsky, who gets about a dozen orders a night for the thick slice that arrives on a
plate with no added flourishes . “It’s exceptional and immaculate. When you taste it, it wows
you.’’

It’s the wild yeast that gives Shvartzapel’s panettone its deep flavor, height and five-week shelf
life. The laborious 40-hour process starts with feeding the wild yeast with water and flour three
times in half a day. After mixing the yeast with more flour, water, sugar, butter and egg yolk, the
dough is proofed for 12 hours before going back into the mixer with more flour, water, sugar,
salt, egg yolk and flavorings. After resting, it is divided into molds, then proofed again. Finally,
the panettones are baked for an hour, then immediately suspended upside-down to cool
overnight.

Shvartzapel’s obsession started at Pierre Hermé, but it took on a life of its own when he showed
up unannounced on the doorstep of Iginio Massari in Italy. Considered the master of panettone,
Massari was the one who taught Hermé. Shvartzapel knew no Italian. Massari knew no English.
But Massari welcomed him. Shvartzapel spent weeks there, dutifully watching, taking notes and
snapping photos, but never daring to help make one.

When he returned to the United States to work at Cyrus in Healdsburg, Shvartzapel finally
attempted his first panettone. Much to his astonishment, it turned out sublime.
Chef Roy Shvartzapel tops a test batch of apple-cranberry panettone with cinnamon
streusel.
Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

He continued baking panettone for the holidays when he moved to Houston to open Common
Bond, where customers would line up an hour before the bakery opened to get their hands on
one.

That was when his wife and business partner, Tali Krakowsky, a global branding specialist and
now a partner in San Francisco’s Prophet, a branding consultancy, encouraged her husband to
focus entirely on that singular treat, selling it in a virtual bakery rather than a brick-and-mortar
one. They funded the business themselves, confident it would be sustainable.

The real test came in February, when Shvartzapel decided to sell a raspberry-pistachio-milk
chocolate version. Panettone for Valentine’s Day? His chef friends thought he was nuts. He sold
nearly 1,000.

“If you told me all of this would happen, I would have thought, ‘OK, maybe after a few years.’
But in our first year? No way,’’ he says. “It’s been amazingly gratifying to devote so much time
and effort to one singular craft and to one singular product.’’

For more information: www.thisisfromroy.com .

Bay Area freelance writer Carolyn Jung blogs at FoodGal.com and is the author of the “San
Francisco Chef’s Table.” Email: food@sfchronicle.com