Caramel Monkey Bread

I've been promising the fiancee monkey bread for quite a while now. Except both of us kept forgetting. Somehow monkey bread or monkeys would come up and we'd both go "Oh yeah." And then promptly forget again. This time, I actually made it though. Probably just because I was on a bit of a bread kick, but no one's complaining.

The dough recipe comes from one of my favorite cook books, The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread.

Ingredients:

• 3.25 oz sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 2.75 oz butter
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon lemon extract
• 16 oz bread or AP flour
• 2 tsp instant yeast
• 9 oz milk
• 1 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2/3 cup heavy cream
• 2/3 cup brown sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon

Directions:

1. Cream together the butter, sugar, and salt. Once smooth, beat in the egg and lemon until smooth.
2. Add the flour, yeast, and milk, and knead until the dough passes the windowpane test.
3. Ferment for 2 hours.
4. Mix together 1 1/2 cups brown sugar and 2/3 cup heavy cream until smooth. Pour half of this mixture into the bottom of a bundt pan.
5. Cut the dough into small bites, about the size of a golf ball.
6. Mix together 2/3 cup brown sugar and 1 tsp cinnamon. Roll each ball in mixture.
7. Place the balls into the pan, not packing too tightly.
8. Pour the rest of the caramel mixture over the dough and allow to proof at room temperature until doubled in size.
9. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
10. Bake for about 20 minutes, until the bread is golden brown.

I promise I'll have more stuff on recipe development and the good 'ol Confectious you're all used to soon. In fact, I'm working on something really big right now! So stay tuned.

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