Monkey Bread is an American term for this insanely delicious sticky bun cake. Essentially its lots of mini doughnuts cooked in a bundt tin, covered in cinnamon sugar and glaze. It is a labour of love but 100% WORTH IT. You will impress the masses with this one. This recipe was developed for My Food Bag.
Dough 50g butter 1 cup milk 1/3 cup water 1/4 cup caster sugar 10g or 2 tsp instant yeast (check the expiry!) 465g plain flour 10g salt Topping 120g butter 200g brown sugar 1 tsp ground cinnamon 50g pecans Glaze 150g icing sugar 2 Tbsp milk The night before or 90 minutes in advance: Heat first measure of butter, milk, water and sugar in a small pot on low heat, until butter is melted and mixture is just warm to the touch but not hot. Remove from heat, stir through yeast and allow to sit for 15 minutes until bubbly. Add flour and salt to a large bowl (or bowl of your stand mixer) make a well in the centre and slowly add milk mixture. Mix to combine using a wooden spoon (or using the dough hook of your mixer). Once the mixture becomes stiff and hard to stir, lightly flour a clean surface and turn out dough (or continue to knead in your mixer). Knead the mixture until it is no longer sticky to touch, about 10 minutes. Grease a large bowl with oil or cooking spray. Shape dough into a ball and place into greased bowl. Cover with cling film and poke a few holes in the surface. Allow dough to rise for at least 1 hour, until doubled in size. On the day: Once dough has risen, melt second measure of butter. Once melted, add brown sugar and cinnamon and stir well. Cut dough into quarters. Roll each quarter into long logs, about 15-20cm. Cut each log into 15 small pieces (they don’t need to be big as they will rise again). Grease a bundt pan or large loaf tin with butter. Sprinkle pecans into bottom of pan. Dip each piece of dough into butter mixture and let any excess drip off, then place into pan on top of pecans. Evenly disperse the dough throughout the pan. Drizzle any remaining butter mixture over top. Cover pan with cling film and set aside to rise for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 180°C. Remove cling film from pan and bake in oven for 30-35 minutes until topping is dark golden and edges begin to bubble. Allow to cool for 5 minutes then turn out onto a large plate or platter. While bread cools, mix together icing sugar and milk until combined. Drizzle over bundt on platter. To serve, pull bread apart and share with friends and family.