Baked Lunchbox

Chocolate Pull-Apart Bread + LOTR + Mumford & Sons

I was baking 2 things last Saturday, Chocolate Pull-Apart Bread and Ginger cookies (will post later) and it took me until 2AM to wrap up everything! Whew! Good thing The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy Soundtrack kept me company! :) I finished all 3 soundtracks + Mumford And Sons album… imagine THAT’S how long it took me to bake this bread! xD

Mumford & Sons

Anyway, so here’s what happened:

Prepare all ingredients all the time before starting. This helps save time and energy, and it’s just really easy to bake with everything in front of you.

Melt the butter together with the milk on a sauce pan. Bring until just simmer.

Then using a swirl attachment of the mixer, mix the melted butter + milk to the flour and other dry ingredients.

Transfer all the batter into a well-greased bowl. Cover it with a clean humid cloth/towel and let it sit for about an hour until it doubles in size. This is where all the waiting begins!

I waited, but instead I made cookies! Haha! ;)

Prepare your work table and flour it. Flour it all over! I mean it! Or else the kneading will not go smoothly.  So after an hour, knead your dough which supposed to be doubled in size. Knead it properly. If it sticks to your hand, flour it. 

Just keep on kneading even if the dough is very sticky. It’s okay that it’s sticky. Knead. Knead. Knead. Flour your hands several times if needed. 

Until your dough comes together. It’s soft to the touch, not sticky, doesn’t easily fall apart and whole. See my work table, it’s all floured up! ;)

Put this ball of dough back to the greased bowl and cover it with the clean humid cloth/towel and let it sit for about 10 minutes before the next step.

Roll it out to more like a rectangular shape than a square, and sprinkle brown sugar/cinnamon/anything you want to add to the bread.

I also added bits of chopped dark chocolate and white chocolate! Omnomnom!

Slice it up and stack to pre-buttered loaf pan. Sprinkle the remaining sugar mix on top.

Let it sit again! This time, the pan should be standing vertically and also covered with a clean humid towel/cloth. Let it sit for about 45 minutes. 

See how flat the slices are, they’re just the same level with the pan… then POOF! Take a look inside the oven!

I just enjoy watching the bread as it rises up and it looks so cool every time it doubles in size. Just look at that! Before, it was just sticky icky dough, and now it turned to pastry bread! Amazing, isn’t it! :)

All the waiting and effort put to this bread, it was worth it! Because I like how it turned out; soft to the bite and not too sweet. With the right soundtrack to motivate me and keep me company, I can do anything! So you can too! :)

Cinnamon Raisin Pull-Apart Bread

This was the best bread I’ve ever made! I had so much fun making it and it was very easy!

I was supposed to roll it out into a square but the dough wasn’t following very much to what direction it was supposed to go, so it ended up being an irregular round/oval/spherical whatever. Doesn’t really matter because I am going to slice it up anyway later.

Sprinkle the cinnamon-raisin-sugar mixture generously on top of the flattened dough.

Slice it up to at least 3 inches thick strips. 

Put them on top of each other. You’ll get a long 3-inch thick layers of long dough with cinnamon-raisin-sugar in between each layer.

Slice them to squares this time. Grab the prepared loaf pan and hold it vertically. Start stacking up the square slices from bottom up. 

(I wasn’t able to take pictures because my hands were all messy and it will be such a hassle if I go wash my hands, take a picture then get messy again - repeat.)

Pop to oven. Mmm-mmmmm! You can see the bread rising and the sugar melting.

And I got this yummy overly cinnamon-raisin-sugared pull-apart bread!

The next day, it was devoured! xD It was so delicious! 

I want to make another one, and try different flavors ;)

Doesn’t matter if it makes you fat! Even Scott Pilgrim loves his bread! xD