Hi Bold Bakers!
I love pizza no matter what shape or form it comes in.
So today I’m going to put a big and bold twist on this family favorite and we are going
to make pizza monkey bread.
So lets get baking.
Monkey bread can be savory and sweet and it is also known as pull-apart bread or tear
and share because it’s broken down into little bready nuggets and you can just pull
off bits as you go.
It’s a really great recipe for the summer and for picnics, that’s why I want to show
you now.
We’re going to start out by making our dough.
Super easy to make, so you can use a stand mixer or you can actually do it by hand.
Doing it by hand, you’re just going to need a lot more elbow grease but it’s totally
doable.
Into our mixing bowl, we’re going to add in our flour.
So my dough is very similar to a dinner roll dough.
It’s milky and nice and soft.
I have seen people use store bought biscuits or pizza crust.
That choice is up to you, however this dough is really easy so I would say try this one
first.
Our next ingredient in is salt, salt is super important in bread-making.
I’m going to put that over on one side of the bowl so I can see where it is.
Our next ingredient in is our dried yeast, now it can be fast-action or active dried
yeast, that’s totally fine.
Now you know my rule, put the salt on one side and the yeast on the other side of the
bowl and after that, they can be mixed in together.
But just don’t put them directly on top of each other.
So I’m just going to give the yeast a little bit of a mix into the flour over there, and
then I’m going to mix the salt in over there on the other side.
Ok great, these are our dry ingredients.
Now we’re going to get our wet ingredients ready.
In a separate jug, add in your milk and cubed butter.
So now what we want to do is just pop this guy into the microwave and just warm up the
milk until it’s blood temperature.
It doesn’t take long at all.
My milk was in the microwave for around 40 seconds.
The butter has melted and I’m going to put my finger in here, and if you can’t feel
the liquid around your finger, that means it’s blood temperature.
It’s the same temperature as your blood, that’s why you shouldn’t be able to feel
it.
It’s the perfect temperature to add into our bread.
Ok we’re ready to go with our dough.
I’m going to put my machine onto a low speed and start to add in my liquid.
I told you this was an easy dough.
You see how our dough is nice and firm and it just all comes together?
This is great.
We’re going to continue kneading now for another 6-8 minutes and just develop all that
gluten.
Ok our dough is looking great.
Off with the machine and now this is how I can tell your dough is looking good.
Because here we have a nice big ball of soft dough, this is perfect.
And the other thing we have is a nice, clean bowl.
This is the result of a good dough.
Now I got asked a question by a bold baker recently called Emerson and she asked me “why
do you always say you have to have a clean bowl at the end?”
And the clean bowl means that you weighed out all your ingredients right and your technique
was perfect so you know you’re on the right track when you’ve got a clean bowl.
Just before we wrap up our dough nice and snug, I’m going to pour in a little bit
of olive oil.
You can also use a flavorless vegetable oil.
You just want to coat your dough and your bowl with your oil.
Now I’ll tell you why, because during the proofing of the dough, the oil will actually
help the dough move up and it won’t restrict it in the bowl.
You want to get some cling wrap, lay it over your bowl nice and tight to make sure that
no air gets in at your dough.
Now what we’re doing here is making a nice little bed for our dough.
Lay a blanket over it.
You have to remember that a dough is a living thing.
It is living and breathing.
It needs air, it needs moisture, it needs warmth, and more importantly, it needs love.
The more care and attention you give your dough, the better your result will be at the
end.
Now I’m going to set him aside at room temperature and let him proof for around two hours or
until he doubles in size.
And then we’re ready to cut him up for our monkey bread.
While your bread dough is proofing, it’s a great time to get the rest of your pizza
ingredients together.
So what I have here are some of my favorite toppings for a pizza.
But if you like olives, whatever ingredients you like, you can throw those into your pizza
monkey bread too.
I have pepperoni, some mozzarella, fresh basil, garlic, I love me some garlic.
And then also some tomato sauce.
Now I’m going to chop up these ingredients and put them into a bowl.
In a nice, big bowl, add in your tomato sauce.
Now you can use homemade tomato sauce or you can use tinned, and I actually have a recipe
on my website on how you can make your own.
Next we’re going to add in our chopped pepperoni.
I’m a bit of a purist when it comes to pizzas so I love just simple pepperoni pizza, it’s
one of my favorites.
In with our chopped fresh basil.
You can rip this by hand, you can chop it, whatever you like.
A must for me is some chopped fresh garlic.
Super important for pizza.
And lastly, a very important ingredient, lashings of mozzarella.
So our pizza sauce is looking and actually smelling really delicious.
I’m going to pop this in the fridge until our dough is ready.
Ok I’m very lightly going to dust my counter with some flour.
Just need a tiny bit.
And then, turn out your dough.
This looks great, just toss your dough in a little bit of flour.
And then with a dough cutter, or a knife, I like to use a dough cutter, just cut off
little bits of your dough.
Just little nuggets.
Now there’s really no rhyme or reason for how you cut this up, just do little bits,
do a little bit bigger, different shapes and sizes.
Just be careful not to cut them too big because you don’t want big lumps of dough.
Ok so that’s it, all chopped up and ready to toss into our pizza sauce.
Add in your dough and then give it a nice stir around so all of your sauce coats your
bread.
This looks fantastic, it’s all lovely and coated like a big bowl of pizza.
It’s ready for our tin.
To bake our monkey bread, I am using a bundt tin and I’m going to put a link on my website
of where I got this.
You don’t have one, that’s totally fine.
You can use always use a cheesecake tin or a cake tin.
Before we put in our dough, I’m actually going to grease my tin with some butter and
I like to do this because it gives your bread a much better, crispier golden brown crust.
Always remember you can use the butter paper to grease the tin.
It’s a great little trick my mom taught me.
Once your tin is buttered, pour in your dough.
Gently move it around the tin so it’s nice and even.
I am really excited to bake this off, however we do need to let it proof again.
If you want to make this the night before, or even two days in advance, you can actually
make it up to this point, cover it in cling wrap, and then put it in the fridge and then
bake it off whenever you want.
But for now, we are going to put some cling wrap over it, the same cling wrap we used
earlier on for our dough.
Waste not want not.
Make it nice and snug, you know the rules, nice and snug, love, warmth, food, all that
good stuff.
Lay over your towel.
Now you’re going to let it proof for around 40 minutes to an hour.
All you want to do is see it rise up and get nice and big.
And then we’re going to bake it off.
So it’s been 45 minutes and I wanted to show you what your monkey bread should look
like when it’s proofed and ready to go.
Oh my gosh this smells insane.
As you can see, it’s nice and puffy.
Give it a little bit of a touch, nice and soft and squishy.
This is great, and actually you can see that it’s risen up to the edge of the tin.
This is what we want.
This means your dough has nicely risen, it’s got some nice bubbles inside.
This guy is ready for the oven.
Bake your monkey bread at 350 degrees Fahrenheit or 180 degrees Celsius for about 30 minutes
or until it’s golden brown.
Our monkey bread is finally out of the oven and it looks fantastic.
It’s lovely golden brown all over the top, when you push it down it’s firm which means
your bread is cooked.
And you can see all that mozzarella gooey yumminess.
This stuff is what food dreams are made of.
Or at least my dreams anyway.
Once your monkey bread comes out of the oven, let it rest for around 15 minutes you do this
because if you take it out of the oven and turn it out straight away, your monkey bread
might fall apart, so you want to give it a little bit of time to cool down and to set.
Once it is set, I’m going to show you a trick of how to get it out of there easily.
I’m going to take my plate, place it on top of my bundt tin, and then really quickly
flip it over.
And then carefully lift off the tin.
This looks amazing, all of the melty cheese and all of the tomato sauce baked into the
bread.
Now while it’s still warm, I’m going to pull off a piece for myself considering it
is tear and share bread.
I’m going to share it with myself.
Oh my gosh.
Some of my favorite things all together, bread, cheese, pepperoni.
This is definitely a big and bold recipe.
I guarantee if you bring this dish to a barbeque or party, people are going to go nuts.
During the summer holidays, make sure you take full advantage of your time and get baking
in the kitchen and I’ll see you back here next week for more Bigger Bolder Baking.