Sourdough Christmas Tree Pull Apart Bread with Cheese + Garlic
This gorgeous sourdough Christmas Tree Pull Apart bread will delight your family and friends with delicious cheese and garlic butter stuffed into each little roll. Perfect for Christmas entertaining with sourdough.
Course Bread
Cuisine American
Keyword Sourdough Recipes, Sourdough Rolls
Prep Time 1 hourhour30 minutesminutes
Cook Time 20 minutesminutes
Fermentation Time 12 hourshours
Total Time 13 hourshours50 minutesminutes
Servings 12People
Calories 321kcal
Equipment
Stand Mixer
Digital Scale
Star Cookie Cutter
Large Baking Sheet
Pastry Brush
Ingredients
Dough
500gBread Flour
100gSourdough StarterFed and bubbly
200gMilkWarm 37C
80gWaterRoom temp
20gSugarFine white
30gButter
10gSalt
Filling
150gMozarellaShredded
50gParmesan CheeseShredded
50gButter
5gGarlic powder
Garlic Butter Topping
10gSalt
60gButter
5gGarlic Powder
20gParmesan CheeseShredded
Instructions
Add warm milk, water and sugar to the bowl of your stand mixer. Mix until the sugar is dissolved.
Now add the flour and sourdough starter and use the stand mixer to knead into a rough dough. Allow to rest for around 30 minutes.
Add the salt and butter and knead the dough until it is silky and elastic. This is such a lovely dough it should be very easy to handle.
Transfer the dough to a bowl and allow it bulk ferment until the dough has risen around 30%.
Cheese and Garlic Filling
While the dough is fermenting, it's time to make the filling for the bread rolls.
Add mozarella, parmesan, butter and garlic to a food processor and blitz until it forms a thick paste. Place this into the fridge to chill until you need it.
Shaping & Filling the Bread Rolls
Once the dough has finished the bulk ferment, you will need to shape and fill the bread rolls with the garlic cheese filling.
Weigh out the dough into whatever size balls you'd like. I've done them at 40g.
Take each piece of dough and add a small ball of filling (approx. 7g) to the centre. Pinch the dough around the filling and gently roll into a ball.
Once you have filled and shaped all of the bread rolls, arrange them on a tray to form the shape of a Christmas tree. Cut out a star if you like and elongate one of the rolls to form the trunk.
Cover the Christmas Tree and allow the rolls to proof and get nice and puffy. See notes for using the fridge for proofing.
Baking the Christmas Tree
Preheat the oven to 180C/356F.
Take the ingredients for the garlic butter topping and blend together. Using a pastry brush, lightly brush a little onto each bread roll (save the rest for when the Christmas Tree comes out of the oven).
Bake the Christmas Tree at 180-C/356F for approximately 20 minutes or until the rolls are golden brown.
Take the Christmas Tree out of the oven and brush on the rest of garlic butter topping so that it melts into the rolls. Sprinkle with fresh rosemary or whatever herbs you would like.
Transfer onto a cooling rack and allow to cool a little before serving (you want it to be warm but not scalding hot).
Serve with Marinara Sauce for dipping.
Notes
This recipe has been created using a stand mixer (Thermomix) to knead the dough. I found this the quickest and easiest way to get a silky and elastic dough (particularly with butter). You can knead it by hand but you'll need to really work the dough to get it silky and elastic and to get the gluten to form.If you want to use the fridge to cold proof these rolls, I suggest allowing them to rise a little bit after shaping and then placing into the fridge. Allow them to come back to room temp before baking. They really do need to be soft and risen before you bake them or they will be tough and dense once baked.