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Babka is a rich bread made with scalded milk, egg yolks, and raisins. This recipe has the addition of cinnamon and sugar over the little rolled balls of dough making it a pull apart cinnamon bun type dessert.
Babka Monkey Bread
Babka Monkey Bread is based on my Babka recipe, also known as Ukrainian Easter Bread, which is something that we make every year. It is one of the richest yeast breads I’ve ever eaten. (How could it not be, with pure egg yolks in it?) This recipe is split into two bundt pans, which if you are having a large family gathering will be just perfect.
Karlynn’s Tip
Do not use an angelfood pan with a removable bottom as the sugars will leak through onto the bottom of your oven.
Ingredients Needed
The ingredients that you need are the same for traditional Easter Babka just a smaller batch sized down to make just enough for two bundt pans.
- warm water
- sugar
- traditional yeast
- butter
- milk
- water
- white sugar
- salt
- egg yolks
- raisins
- turmeric or saffron (just for color)
- flour
- Sugar Mixture:
- brown sugar
- cinnamon
Do I Have To Make This in a Bundt Pan?
No, you could also make the monkey bread in two square pans if you wanted, the shape would just be different. You can also use a 9×13 pan but just ensure that you leave enough room for the bread to expand upwards and not overflow.
More Monkey Bread Recipes for You to Try
I have a ton of monkey bread recipes on this site! Try some of these tasty variations:
Happy Baking everyone!
Love,
Karlynn
Babka Monkey Bread
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup of warm water
- 1/2 teaspoon sugar
- 1 tablespoon of traditional yeast
- 1/2 cup of butter
- 1 cup of milk
- 1/2 cup of water
- 1/4 cup + 2 Tbl of white sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon of salt
- 3 egg yolks
- 1 cups of raisins
- 1/4 teaspoon turmeric or saffron can be left out this colors it yellow
- 4- 41/2 cups of flour
Sugar Mixture:
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
Instructions
- Place the butter, milk and sugar in a pot and bring it to a near boil, you want to slightly scald the milk. You can also heat it in the microwave as well to the point of scalded. (near boil)Mix the cup of cold water and the hot milk in a bowl for a stand mixer. (or the large bowl you are using to combine all ingredients.)
- Take the 1/2 cup of warm water and sugar, mix in your yeast thoroughly and let it start bubbling away.
- Beat your egg yolks and turmeric. The turmeric gives the bread it’s lovely color. (You can also use 3 whole eggs instead of the 6 egg yolks but the yolks make a richer bread. So 3 eggs OR 6 yolks)
- Add it to the cooled milk mixture in the mixer bowl.Then add the yeast mixture to the bowl.
- Using a stand mixer with the dough hook attachment, place the bowl of liquid ingredients on the mixer.
- Mix the salt into your flour then add in the first four cups of flour to the bowl with the dough hook going on the lowest speed, then add your raisins. Then slowly add another 4-5 cups until the dough is slightly sticky. The dough should stick to your hand very slightly, but be a nice elastic dough.
- Once that’s done it needs to rise. Put it into a bowl in a nice warm place and cover it with a damp tea towel.Once it’s doubled in size, it’s time to punch it down.
- Divide the dough into two even pieces.
- Take the dough and on a lightly floured work surface roll each piece into a 9 inch by 9 inch square.
- Once you have that 9×9 square, mark off 9 sections, each way, so you are ending up with 81 lovely little squares.
- Cut the squares apart,making sure to separate them as you cut, they love to stick back together which defeats the purpose entirely.
- Melt the ½ cup of butter in a bowl.
- In a larger bowl combine the brown sugar and 2½ tsp of cinnamon.
- Rolls a dough square into a ball, dip it in the butter, dip it in the sugar mixture then place it in the bundt pan.
- Stagger the layers. Build like you would build a brick wall, staggering the layers so that the seams are not in the same place, building a lovely wall of dough.
- When finished, place a clean towel over the tops of the pans and let rise again.In about 45-50 minutes the dough will rise almost to the top of the pan.
- Preheat the oven to 350 then place the bundt pans in the oven on the second from the bottom rack.
- To prevent the tops from browning too much, place a large oven sheet on a top rack above the bundts, thus preventing the top heat from over cooking the tops of the bundts.
- Bake for 25-30 minutes.
- You can test the bread with a thermometer inserted into the middle, this eggy bread will be done around the 198-200 degree F mark. There’s nothing worse than soggy monkey bread, so this is my trick to making sure it’s done perfectly.
- Remove from the oven and cool slightly then invert onto the serving plate.
Nutrition
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MrsClay says
Reading through your post (this looks absolutely delicious for the record) I noticed that you mention a cinnamon and sugar dip after being coated in butter but its not listed in the ingredients. Is it similar to your other monkey bread recipe 1 c brown sugar 2 1/2 tsp cinnamon? (which was well received at a recent gathering I went to thanks so much for the recipe!) I’ve bookmarked the other recipe to refer back to but I was just curious. I’m looking forward to trying this one out as well.
To many more Sweet Treats!
Mrs Clay.
Jeannine says
Sounds delicious! There is a discrepancy in the egg yolks versus whole eggs between the ingredient list and the instructions. You list 3 egg yolks but then talk about 3 whole eggs vs 6 egg yolks. Confusing.