Cinnamon Raisin Pull Apart Bread

Since we were blizzarding Friday night, it was a good chili night. When it's cold outside, I go into baking mode even more, and cinnamon rolls were always what went with chili in the elementary school cafeteria, and that stuck with me!

I saw these monkey bread like muffin things on this website, complete with droolworthy pictures (seriously, for good pictures, click that link; for my not good pictures, keep scrolling). If you're going to make these, make sure you read through the whole thing first to catch all of the ingredients...I took a couple pictures along the way to help me remember next time, so the recipe is written as we go here, too.

First, you make the dough:

Stir this together:
1 1/2 c whole wheat flour
1 1/2 c AP flour
2 t salt
1 1/2 t active dry yeast

Add:
1 c + 2 T lukewarm water
2 T olive oil

Stir this together, then turn out onto floured surface (every last bit!), put the bowl over it, and let it sit there five minutes (great tip from Joy!).
Go back and knead it for a couple minutes to form a smooth ball (again, look at her great step by step pictures for more info...)

Spray your bowl (yes, you can keep using the same one!) with Pam, then toss the dough back in, turn it to coat, and cover it with sprayed plastic wrap. Let it sit in a warm place for 2 to 2.5 hours, or put it in the fridge overnight to return to it tomorrow. (read her instructions for more on that...)

After the first rise, lightly press out the dough, knead it again for about three minutes, and let it sit for another thirty.

Preheat your oven to 350--you're almost there!

Grease a muffin pan (12) or baking dish with spray and sprinkle with flour.

Get the dough back out onto your floured surface and press it out to 3/4 inch thick. Start cutting into 1 inch chunks. After all your chunks are cut, sprinkle them with flour, then sugar, then cinnamon.

In a separate bowl, combine: (I changed my measurements slightly to reflect my preferences..)
1/2 c unsalted butter
1 c brown sugar
1/3 c granulated sugar
3 T flour
1/2 t cornstarch
1/2 c raisins
1 1/2 t cinnamon

Start filling your muffin tins/baking dish--
for the muffins-- put about three chunks in the bottom, loosely filling it halfway. Top with 1 T of the brown sugar mixture, a few more chunks, and another part of the brown sugar mixture. If using a baking dish, just layer chunks, brown sugar mixture, chunks, b.s. mixture... (again, look at her pictures!)

Bake for about 15 minutes, let cool for 15 minutes, loosen with knife, and take out of tin to devour, because you've waited long enough!! Ours was gone by the next morning's breakfast....



Mine didn't stick together, and I think it's because there was too much brown sugar compared to the melty butter...that's why I changed my measurements to cut back on the b.s. and keep the same amount of butter.
I don't think anybody noticed though...they were awesome!
If you don't feel like waiting around for dough to rise, you could just cut lots of corners and use refrigerated biscuit dough, but then that just isn't the same, is it??