Cooking with Juls: Monkey Bread

Monkey Bread

I have never made Monkey Bread before today and it came out very nice. Was asked by a few to please share my version of this sweet bread.

There are couple of methods, since I am no good with dough, I generally make dough in bulk and freeze loaves and rolls. Or I buy the pre-made frozen dough. Ive included three ways to make dough. But this time I made a sweet dough in my bread machine. Any of these methods with work.

Dough: About a dozen frozen rolls. Put in a greased pie pan let rise until double. I cover with a dark colored cloth and put into a warmed oven. Warmed oven: turn oven on the 170 degrees, until preheat light goes off. Open the oven door let cool for about 5 minutes. put prepared dough into the oven, then close oven. Check every 30 mins to see how much they've risen. Takes about an hour to an hour and half.

Dough: Bread Machine Homemade sweet dough :
2 cups warm water
2/3 cup white sugar( I actually used half this amount of sugar)
1 1/2 tablespoons active dry yeast
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 cup vegetable oil
6 cups bread flour (Can use regular flour or white whole wheat.)

I use my bread machine at this point and add the dry ingredients, then the wet and make a hole in the dry part of the concoction and add the yeast all by itself. Set machine on 'dough" and pull the dough out after the first rise.

Handmade Sweet Dough:

Same Ingredients as Bread machine dough. Method is different.

In a large bowl, dissolve the sugar in warm water, and then stir in yeast. Allow to proof until yeast resembles a creamy foam. I have never been able to get this part right. Its why i use the machine!
Mix salt and oil into the yeast. Mix in flour one cup at a time. Knead dough on a lightly floured surface until smooth. Place in a well oiled bowl, and turn dough to coat. Cover with a damp cloth. Allow to rise until doubled, about 1 hour.

Now u want a bundt type pan. Grease well, I use Butter Pam Spray. Set aside. Preheat oven to350.

Filling:

Can be a combination of any flavors u like., My Mom has used Mince meat pie filling. Was surprisingly very good. Can use canned pie fillings, like peach or cherry. For todays I am using:

2 Tart Apples
1/3 cup raisins
1/3 cup cran raisins
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 T all purpose flour.
1/2 packed brown sugar
1/3 cup of butter ( I used I cant believe its not butter, worked fine)

Core apples and chop into small pieces, about the same size as the raisins. Put in a mixing bowl add the raisins, walnuts and cran raisins. Toss with the cinnamon and nutmeg, brown sugar and flour. Melt the butter until very soft, but not liquid. and drizzle over the apple mixture, take a rubber spatula and toss well to coat.

Put 1/3 of the mixture in the prepared bundt pan. Spread around evenly on the bottom.

You want to slightly layer the dough and the apple mixture. So that some of the mix gets between the balls while baking. Repeat until you run out of both.

Tear dough into 1 inch pieces roll into a ball. Set on top of mixture all haphazardly. Add some more mixture, then another layer of the dough balls, ending with some of the mixture on top. Return to a warm oven and let rise until double, about an hour to an hour and half.

It will resemble something like this: