Monkey Balls & Pizza

If I had a dime for every recipe I bookmarked and then failed to remember to actually make, I’d be one rich lady! I like to bookmark from Pintrest (or, “like” things, I guess) and then Flipbook opened up a whole new world of recipes that I can let my mouth water over – if you don’t have the app on your phone, or ipad, I suggest you get it, and soon!

let the yeast sit in the warm water for about 5 mins before you start mixing

Jessica, recently pinned my breakfast post, which I greatly appreciate! It was tasty! I hope you’ve tried it! There really is nothing like a good soft bread used in french toast - even though most of my childhood memories are mainly of using almost on the way out/stale breads for french toast. I noticed this,when I signed in to pintrest and snooped around her favorite recipes she’d collected – she has these recipes all nicely organized in different categories. I found this thing called cinnamon sugar messy bread- oh my god. It looked like the things dreams are made of!

I’ve never had monkey bread before, I’ve never even made it. I’m oh-so-familiar with cinnamon toast, but that’s as close as I’ve ever gotten. Aunty Denise calls it “monkey balls” and I got such a good laugh out of this (overtired and a few glasses of wine deep) that I will now forever call it as such!

I found the time on Friday night, after an unexpected second wind, to try this. The pizza dough has to raise for more than an hour, which normally would make me nutty, but I was proactive and took that time to sort through all the papers I’ve kept in storage for YEARS. Holy crap! I never throw a damn thing away, apparently. Hello, tangent….

Once this dough sat and rose, I separated it in half. I decided I’d make messy bread with half, and then a cheese pizza with the other half.

I stuck a stick of butter in a little Pyrex dish and melted it in the microwave  I used unsalted butter. Even though I LOVE butter, and would love to add it to most things, this even seems like a lot to me.

I mixed  the cinnamon powder and sugar together in another small glass bowl. I rolled out the dough and chopped it up into little … balls, if you will.

Dip in butter, shake off excess (or else your fingers will be the only thing really coated in sugar and cinnamon…) butter and then coat in sugar mixture.

in the pan

Pile up into well greased bread pans ( I used two 3″x5″ pans) and remember that the dough will raise again a little bit when you start to bake it.

When you are done, try really hard not to eat the whole thing yourself, in one sitting. I didn’t make the icing, because I forgot to buy confectioner’s sugar – I’m sure that would’ve been even more amazing.

be nicer to your camera than I am to mine… wash your hands thoroughly before snapping a shot – it makes your camera look like it went through a buttery desert otherwise!

The other half of the dough I decided to make some supper with, by this time it was edging ever closer to the 10 o’clock hour, and I was finally less distracted and able to recognize hunger. I preheated the oven to 425 degrees.

prep for sauce making

Pizza sauce

1 container grape tomatoes
garlic
onions
1/2 can tom paste
italian seasoning
parley
crushed red peppers
olive oil
basil
oregano
salt & pepper to taste
Pulse in mini food processer until desired consistency is achieved.

Shape dough, put the dough down on a piece of parchment paper so you can easily transfer to to pizza stone (if you are using one, I was…) after preheating it.  Put a little bit of olive oil on the dough, add sauce, and top with mozzarella cheese (grated) cook until browned on top and edges of crust, and all the cheese is melted.

all done – in roughly 10 mins!

This dough makes a very good thin crust pizza. I’m a huge fan and I’m going to keep this dough in the rotation! I suggest you try it, even though you have to wait a little long for the dough to raise.

monkey balls, when done cooking

My boyfriend ate the entire rest of the pizza when he wanted lunch the next day. MMmmmmm! It was so good. I may or may not have eaten more than two slices myself….

Tagged: cheese pizza, monkey bread, pizza, pizza dough, recipes, recipes found online, two meals in one

Posted in: carbs, leftover, sauce/dip, storing food, weeknight meals