This pull-apart pizza bread is flavored with cheese and Italian seasoning and baked until it’s fluffy and soft. Dip it in marinara and you get everything you love about pizza in a savory bread form.
Pull apart bread has been all over the food blogs lately. The ability to pull off the loaf piece by piece makes this kind of bread so fun to eat. Most of the ones I’ve been seeing are sweet cinnamon pull-apart bread, resembling monkey bread.
Then I saw a recipe for a savory one with herbs and garlic and I knew this was something my family would enjoy. I wanted my savory one to taste like pizza bread so I thought about using a pizza bread dough initially, but I really wanted to try the dough from the recipe I found. So, I played around with it to create pull-apart pizza bread.
I filled my dough with Italian seasoning and cheese so the bread pieces ended up tasting just like the breadsticks you might get with a pizza. They tasted great on their own or you can also dip them in marinara sauce.
Recipe Tips
- The dough is made with yeast which means it’s not super quick. Be sure to plan ahead because the dough needs to proof twice before it’s ready for the oven.
- You can make the dough by hand, but it’s a lot faster to use a stand mixer. If you do it by hand you will need extra time to knead the dough.
- After the first rise, you will punch the dough down and roll it out into a rectangle. At this point, you can brush it with butter and sprinkle Italian seasoning over the top. Then you can cut it into squares.
- The easiest way to get the dough squares into the pan is to first stack them on top of each other. Then you can take the stack, turn it and slide it into the pan.
- For the second rise, you want the dough squares to puff up so they fill the pan. I had trouble with this and had to move my pan to a warmer spot. So, depending on the temperature of your kitchen, it could take more or less time.
After you bake the pull-apart bread, you’ll want to cool it in the pan. I like to serve it warm so once it’s cooled off a bit, I carefully turned it out and placed it on a serving plate. It’s so good with some marinara on the side for dipping.
This bread was a huge hit with the family. Everyone loved how much it tasted like breadsticks and how soft and fluffy the dough was. The loaf didn’t last long so next time I’ll have to make two.
More Recipe Ideas
If you like to bake here are a few more snack ideas you might like to try, too:
- Best Homemade Soft Pretzels
- Hasselback Pesto Cheese Bread
- Brazilian Cheese Breads
- Pepperoni Garlic Knots
- Pizza Cupcakes
Pull Apart Pizza Bread
Ingredients
- 3 cups bread flour
- 1 cup warm water
- 1 packet (2 1/4 tsp) yeast
- 2 tbsp granulated sugar
- tsp salt
- 2 tbsp unsalted butter melted
- Italian seasoning
- Shredded cheese I used an Italian cheese blend
Instructions
- Combine warm water, sugar, and yeast in a bowl of a stand mixer and set aside for a few minutes (until foamy). Add butter and salt to the yeast mixture, then sift in flour 1 cup at a time, until dough forms. Mix with dough hook attachment at medium speed, until dough is smooth, about 8 minutes. Place dough in an oiled bowl, cover with saran wrap or a damp towel, and set in a warm area for about an hour, or until doubled.
- Punch down dough and turn out on a well-floured surface. Roll dough out into a large rectangle, about ¼ of an inch thick. Brush butter over the entire surface of the dough, then cover evenly with italian seasoning and cheese.
- Using a sharp knife, slice the dough into squares. Use your best judgment for size, depending on the type of pan you are using (my squares were approximately 3 inches x 2 inches, or just high enough to peak over the top of the tin). Stack slices and place in a greased 9" x 5" loaf pan lined with parchment paper. Cover and let rise for another 40 minutes or until dough fills entire loaf pan. (It took me another hour in a warm place, about 78F.)
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Bake for 30–35 minutes (or until tops begin to turn golden brown) and knife inserted comes out clean. Remove from the oven and serve while warm.
Notes
The nutrition information provided are only estimates based on an online nutritional calculator. I am not a certified nutritionist. Please consult a professional nutritionist or doctor for accurate information and any dietary restrictions and concerns you may have.
Oh my goodness, this pizza bread looks awesome! It this pull-apart form, there is nooo way it would last a day in my house. 😀 Looks delish!
It’s funny how making it into a certain shape suddenly makes the bread even more irresistible. Sometimes I have to beg and coax people into finishing things I made in my house, but this bread was gone very quickly.
Looks delicious, Kirbie! Another method I use to speed up proofing is turning on the oven light. Just the heat from the light is enough to get the temp up to round 80 degrees. I like the microwave with the boiling water method for breads that need the extra moisture.
Hmm. I did not know that the oven light was strong enough to warm up the oven. Thanks for the tip. I think I”ll do that next time. My brother was giving me strange looks when I put the bread dough next to the plants for this one.
You probably know this, but a trick I use to proof on a cold day or just speed it up is boil some water in a coffee cup in the microwave, move it to the side, and set my pan in the microwave to rise.
I’ve never tried that method. Usually I will turn my oven on for a minute until it begins to warm up, then turn it off and pop the bread in there to proof.