Cinnamon Sugar Pull-Apart Bread

Do you like sugar? Do you like cinnamon? Do you find yourself mindlessly nibbling on bread throughout the day? Okay, maybe the last one's just me, but once you try this recipe you'll definitely be screaming out "ALL OF THE ABOVE BABY."

It's a long one, but it's not so bad and I mean come'on, something this delicious is worth it.

LET'S DO THIS THANG.

For the Dough You'll Need:

2 1/4 tsps (1 envelope) active dry yeast

1/4 cup water

1 tsp sugar

2 3/4 cups all purpose flour

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup unsalted butter

1/3 cup milk

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

For the Filling You'll Need:

1/2 cup brown sugar          |  you can use all brown sugar, all regular sugar or any mix

1/2 cup sugar                     |  in between as long as it equals on heaping cup ;)

2 tsps cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4 cup butter, browned

In a lil bowl, mix together the yeast, water and sugar. Stir until all the yeast balls (attractive) have dissolved. Set aside for ten minutes - it'll get big and foamy, yay!

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together TWO cups of flour (save the 3/4s for later), sugar and salt. Let it be.

In another bowl, whip up those eggs, set those aside too (you need to muck up a lot of bowls and counter-space for this, but it's totally worth it).

Heat the butter and milk together until the butter is all melted - you can probably do this in the microwave, but I did it in a small pot. Remove from heat and mix in the vanilla.

Here's the fun bit - bring all these ingredients together in your large bowl. So pour in the butter/milk/vanilla concoction in with the flour/sugar/salt mixture and.. well.. mix! Add the foamy yeast and mix. Then finally, add the eggs, and, you guessed it, mix. Things didn't seem to be mixing very well, so I brought out my old-fart hand mixer. It did the trick. Now add the remaining 3/4 cup of flour and stir stir stir. I know what you're thinking, PUT THE FLOUR DOWN. The dough should be sticky, it wants to be sticky, let it be sticky!

Grease a big-old bowl and plop in the dough. Cover with plastic wrap and a clean towel. Place the big bowl'o dough in a warm space for about an hour/or until dough has doubled in size.

Eat something. You've been through a lot and we're only half way there.

While the dough is rising, mix the sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg together in a bowl - set it aside. Melt the butter in a pan over low heat until brown. You'll know you're getting there when the most heavenly scent touches your nostrils. I mean really, nothing in this whole universe could smell better. Don't stand around smelling it for too long, because things can get ugly FAST (just ask my totally scorched batch of butter). Remove from heat and poor into a bowl lickity-split - set aside. 

Grease and flour a 9x5x3 inch loaf pan - set aside.

Once the dough is nice and big, you're gonna throw some flour on it and just beat the shit outta it. Or knead it. Whatever. I used 2 spoons of flour - basically keep sprinkling and kneading until it looses it's super stickiness. Put the dough back in the bowl for about 5 minutes while you get your counter all cleaned-up and lightly floured. Flour your hands and your rolling pin, take the dough out of the bowl and put it onto the counter.  Roll the dough until it's about 12 inches tall and 20 inches long. Use a pastry brush to spread all of that yummy browned butter over the dough. Sprinkle that whole bowl of sugar/cinnamon/nutmeg on top - don't be shy. I also used a spoon with a little bit of pressure to smush all the sugary goodness into the buttery dough.

I used a pizza cutter to slice the dough vertically into six equalish strips. Stack the strips on top of each other and slice into six equalish squares. Place each stack in the pan so the top looks like the side of a book. Place a towel over it again and let sit until it fills out a bit more - about 45 minutes. 

Once the oven is at 350 degrees, pop in your loaf pan (without the towel, of course!) and bake for 30-35 minutes - the top should be nice and brown.

Let it hang out in the pan for about 20-30 minutes. Take a butter knife to the edges of the pan to free your delicious creation, put it on a pretty plate and flip it so it's right-side-up again. Plug in the kettle, make a tea and watch the bread magically disappear. 

YUM.

YUM.

A MILLION TIMES YUM.