Sourdough Monkey Bread

Ingredients

Levain

• 20g (1 Tbsp) mature sourdough starter
• 100g (3/4 cup + 1 Tbsp) bread flour
• 60g (1/4 cup) water, room temperature

Dough

• 400g (3 1/3 cups) bread flour
• 220g (1 cup) whole milk, warm (about 90F / 32C)
• 100g (2 eggs) large eggs
• 50g (1/4 cup) granulated sugar
• 60g (4 Tbsp) unsalted butter, softened
• 9g (1 1/2 tsp) fine salt

Butter Bath

• 170g (12 Tbsp) unsalted butter, melted

Cinnamon Sugar Coating

• 150g (3/4 cup) light brown sugar, packed
• 100g (1/2 cup) granulated sugar
• 8g (1 Tbsp) ground cinnamon
• 1g (1/4 tsp) fine salt

Brown Sugar Caramel

• 85g (6 Tbsp) unsalted butter
• 110g (1/2 cup) light brown sugar, packed
• 30g (2 Tbsp) heavy cream
• 5g (1 tsp) vanilla extract
• 1g (1/4 tsp) fine salt

Equipment

• 10 to 12 cup bundt pan
• Stand mixer with dough hook (or your hands)
• Digital kitchen scale
• Dough whisk
• Bench scraper
• Starter home for consistent temperature
• Two medium mixing bowls
• Small saucepan
• Instant-read thermometer
• Rimmed sheet pan

Method

Friday Morning: Build the Levain

1. Mix the levain. Stir 20g mature starter into 60g room temperature water until it disperses, then work in 100g bread flour until you have a stiff, shaggy ball. Cover it and leave it at 75 to 78F (24 to 26C).
2. Know when it's ready. In 6 to 10 hours the levain will have roughly doubled, domed on top, and it smells sweet and yogurty rather than sharp and vinegary. This is a stiff levain at 60 percent hydration, which ferments slower and gives you more sweetness and less acid. That matters in an enriched dough loaded with sugar.

Friday Evening: Mix

1. Combine and mix. In the mixer bowl, combine all 180g of ripe levain with 220g warm whole milk and 100g eggs, breaking the levain up in the liquid. Add 400g bread flour, 50g granulated sugar, and 9g fine salt. Mix on low until there's no dry flour, about 2 minutes, then medium-low for 6 minutes.
2. Add the butter. With the mixer on medium-low, add 60g softened butter a tablespoon at a time, letting each one disappear before the next. The dough breaks and looks greasy, then comes back smooth and glossy over 8 to 10 minutes. Stop when it clears the bowl and passes the windowpane test. Sourdough enriched dough takes longer to come together than a yeasted one. Be patient with it.
3. Check the dough temperature. You're aiming for a final dough temperature of 78 to 80F (26 to 27C). Warmer than that and it moves too fast overnight. Cooler and the bulk drags. Adjust with the milk temperature next time you make it.

Friday Evening: Bulk

1. Ferment with folds. Move the dough to a buttered bowl. Let it go 2 to 3 hours at 76 to 78F (24 to 26C), giving it a set of stretch and fold at the 45 and 90 minute marks. You want it grown by about 50 percent, puffy and jiggly, not doubled. It finishes rising in the pan tomorrow.

Friday Night: Into the Fridge

1. Chill overnight. Cover the bowl tightly and refrigerate 10 to 14 hours. The cold retard does two jobs here. It builds flavor overnight, and it firms the butter in the dough so tomorrow morning you can cut and roll pieces without them turning into a sticky mess in your hands. Do not skip it.

Saturday Morning: Butter, Sugar, Caramel

1. Melt the butter bath. Melt 170g butter into a wide shallow bowl and let it cool to just warm. Too hot and it runs right off the cold dough.
2. Mix the cinnamon sugar. In a second wide bowl, rub 150g light brown sugar, 100g granulated sugar, 8g cinnamon, and 1g salt together until no brown sugar lumps remain. Set the two bowls side by side.
3. Cook the caramel. Melt 85g butter with 110g brown sugar over medium heat, stirring until smooth and bubbling, about 2 minutes. Off the heat, stir in 30g heavy cream, 5g vanilla, and 1g salt. Set aside to thicken.
4. Prep the pan. Butter the bundt pan heavily into every groove and up the center tube, then dust with granulated sugar and tap out the excess.

Saturday Morning: Portion and Roll

1. Divide the cold dough. Turn the cold dough onto a lightly floured counter and press it into a rough rectangle about an inch thick. Cut it into strips with a bench scraper, then across into roughly 55 pieces, about 18g each. Cold dough cuts clean. This is the payoff for the overnight retard.
2. Roll them through. A handful at a time, roll the pieces in the melted butter, let the excess drip, then tumble them in the cinnamon sugar. Move them to a sheet pan. Work quickly while the dough is still cool.

Stack the Pan

1. Layer the pieces. Drop the coated pieces loosely into the pan. Don't pack them. The air gaps let the caramel run down through the loaf. Fill no more than two thirds up the pan.

Saturday Morning: The Long Proof

1. Proof from cold. Cover the pan loosely and let it rise 2 to 3 hours at room temperature. It's starting cold and it's leavened by wild yeast, so this takes real time. You're waiting for the dough to reach about three quarters up the pan with the pieces just touching each other, and the top pieces should feel airy and give under a light touch.
2. Don't rush it. This is the single place sourdough monkey bread fails. An under-proofed loaf bakes up dense with a gummy center, and no amount of extra oven time fixes it. If your kitchen is cool, find a warm spot or set the pan on a proofer. Add an hour if you need it.
3. Preheat. Thirty minutes before you bake, heat the oven to 350F (175C), rack in the center.

Bake It Through

1. Pour the caramel. Only now, right before it goes in, spoon the warm caramel over the proofed dough and let it settle into the gaps. Scrape any leftover cinnamon sugar over it.
2. Bake. Set the bundt pan on a rimmed sheet pan to catch overflow. Bake at 350F (175C) for 34 to 40 minutes. Tent loosely with foil if the top darkens before 25 minutes.
3. Check the center. Push an instant-read thermometer through the side into the middle of the loaf. You want 190 to 200F (88 to 93C). Color lies on this bake. The thermometer doesn't.

Flip It While It's Hot

1. Rest, then flip. Let the pan sit 8 to 10 minutes, no longer. Run a thin knife around the outer edge and the center tube, set a plate over the pan, and flip it in one motion. Leave the pan resting on top a minute so the caramel drips, then lift it off.
2. Serve warm. Spoon any caramel left in the pan over the top. Pull it apart with your hands. The tang comes through underneath all that brown sugar, and that's the whole reason to build it on a levain.

Make It Savory

Monkey bread is a dough plus three layers. A fat, a coating, and a sauce. Swap any one of the three and you've got a new bread. The dough barely changes at all. The sourdough tang works even better in savory than it does in sweet, and it's the reason I'd point you here over the yeasted version if savory is where you're headed. Once you see it that way, you stop asking permission and start inventing.

1. Change one: drop the sugar. Cut the granulated sugar in the dough from 50g down to 15g. That's enough to feed fermentation and brown the crust, but not enough to taste sweet. You're not removing the sugar, you're demoting it. Everything else in the dough stays exactly as written.
2. Change two: the butter bath becomes the flavor. The cinnamon sugar and the brown sugar caramel are gone completely. This is still an enriched dough, so the butter matters as much as it did before, it's just carrying different flavor now. Skip both. That means your melted butter is doing all the work now. Garlic goes in there. Herbs go in there. Pepper, paprika, whatever you're building toward. Everything lives in that butter, so build it with intention and taste it before you roll anything through it.
3. Change three: raise the heat. Bake at 375F (190C) instead of 350F (175C). There's no sugar coating to burn, so you can push the temperature, and the higher heat gives you better crust on the exposed pieces. Figure 28 to 34 minutes. Same internal target, 190F (88C). Butter the pan but skip the sugar dusting, savory pans release fine without it.
4. Use a skillet if you have one. A 10-inch cast iron skillet beats the bundt for savory every time. Crispier edges, easier to serve, better on a dinner table next to a pot of soup. The bundt still works. The skillet is just better here.
5. Assemble and bake. Everything else runs the same as the sweet version. Cut into roughly 55 pieces, roll them through your savory butter, tumble them in cheese or seasoning, and stack them loosely in the pan. Tuck any cubed cheese or meat down into the gaps as you go rather than mixing it into the coating. Proof, bake, and check the center with a thermometer. Then the same 8 to 10 minute rest before you turn it out.

Tip: Cubes, not shredded. Shredded cheese melts away into the coating and disappears. Cubed cheese tucked between the dough balls melts into pockets, and those pockets are the whole effect you're after.

Baking

Oven: 175°C / 350°F. Internal temperature when done: 91°C / 195°F.

Bake time: 34 to 40 minutes

Storage

• Room temperature: Best warm from the pan. Covered at room temperature it holds 3 days, a day longer than the yeasted version thanks to the fermentation acids.
• Refrigerated: Up to 5 days covered. Warm before serving so the crumb softens back up.
• Frozen: Freeze the baked loaf whole or in chunks up to 3 months, wrapped tight. You can also freeze the assembled unproofed pan, then thaw overnight in the fridge and proof 3 to 4 hours at room temperature.
• Refresh: Warm the loaf at 300F (150C) for 10 to 12 minutes, or microwave single pieces for 15 seconds.

Bake-along timing: build the levain Friday morning around 8:00, mix Friday evening around 6:00, bulk until 9:00, then into the fridge overnight. Saturday morning cut and coat at 8:00, proof until about 11:00, and pull it out of the oven a little before noon.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I use discard instead of building a levain?

Not on its own. Discard has flavor but not enough active yeast to lift an enriched dough carrying this much sugar and butter. If you want to use discard, add 100g of it to the yeasted version of this recipe and reduce the milk by 50g and the flour by 50g. You get the tang without the timeline.

How do I fit this into a Saturday bake-along?

Build the levain Friday morning around 8:00. Mix the dough Friday evening around 6:00, bulk it until 9:00, and refrigerate overnight. Saturday morning cut and coat starting at 8:00, proof until about 11:00, and it comes out of the oven a little before noon. The overnight retard is what makes the Saturday morning part manageable.

Can I skip the cold retard and bake it same day?

You can, but I'd rather you didn't, and here's why. Room temperature enriched sourdough is soft and greasy to handle, so cutting and rolling 55 pieces becomes a fight. The cold firms the butter and makes the whole assembly clean. If you must go same day, bulk 5 to 6 hours until grown by 70 percent, then chill just 45 minutes before cutting.

My final proof took forever. Is that normal?

Yes. You're starting with cold dough, wild yeast, and a sugar load that slows fermentation down. Two to three hours is normal, and in a 65F kitchen it can run four. Proof by look and feel, not by clock. Pieces just touching, dough about three quarters up the pan, top pieces airy under a light press.

How do I make a savory sourdough version?

Three changes. Drop the dough sugar from 50g to 15g, skip the cinnamon sugar and caramel completely so the butter bath becomes your flavor carrier, and bake at 375F (190C) instead of 350F with the same 190F (88C) internal target. The sourdough tang works even better in savory than it does in sweet. The full walkthrough with all four variations is in the Savory Version section at the bottom of this recipe.

Why is my sourdough version denser than the yeasted one?

Almost always under-proofing. Wild yeast in a sugar-heavy dough works slower than commercial yeast, and most people call the proof too early out of impatience. The second cause is a levain that was past peak when it went in, meaning it was already deflating and had spent its power. Use it when it's domed and rising, not after it's fallen.

How mature should my starter be before I try this?

It should be doubling reliably within 6 to 8 hours of a feed at room temperature. If your starter is still sluggish or unpredictable, bake the yeasted version first, get comfortable with the assembly, and come back to this one. There's no shame in that order. It's the smart order.

Nutrition

Per serving (1 serving (about 1/12 of the loaf)): 495 calories, 66g carbohydrates, 8g protein, 22g fat, 2g fiber, 340mg sodium. Makes 12 servings.