Pull Apart Bread with cheese and basil pesto

Ingredients (for a loaf pan)
For the dough
200 g of 100% Italian Wheat – type 0 flour
100 of Type 0 Manitoba flour
12.5 g of fresh yeast
1 teaspoon of granulated sugar
125 g of fresh whole milk, slightly warm
40 g of softened butter at room temperature
1 egg at room temperature
1 teaspoon salt
1 clove of garlic (optional)
Basil

For the filling
200 g of basil pesto + 50 g for brushing (optional)
125 g of mozzarella, well-drained and cut into thin slices
100 g of grated Grana Padano

Procedure
Place the flour in the bowl of the stand mixer, make a well in the center, and add the yeast and sugar. Pour in the lukewarm milk, cover with a kitchen towel, and let rest for 5–10 minutes. Now attach the dough hook to the mixer, or knead the dough by hand in the bowl, and add the egg and the garlic (crushed and peeled, with the central germ removed), finely chopped with a knife. Knead, then add the butter and salt only at the very end; continue kneading until the butter is completely incorporated and the dough is soft. Shape the dough into a ball, transfer it to a greased bowl, and cover with plastic wrap. Let it rise in a slightly warm place (e.g., an oven turned off but with the light on) until it doubles in volume, for about 60–90 minutes. While the dough is rising, grease a 20×10 cm loaf pan with high sides. Once the rising time is up, turn the dough out onto a work surface and divide it into 12 equal pieces. Flatten each piece to form a disc about 10 cm in diameter. It doesn’t have to be perfectly round—if it’s slightly elongated, it will be easier to fill and handle. Spread 1–2 teaspoons of pesto on each dough disc and top with a slice of mozzarella and a little grated Grana Padano. At this point, fold the discs in half, like small panzerotti, and arrange them in the pan, placing them with the opening facing up. Let them rise for another 45 minutes in a slightly warm place, until the dough has puffed up. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 200 °C in conventional mode. Once the dough has finished rising, bake your pull-apart bread by placing the rack in the center of the oven for 10 minutes. Then, lower the temperature to 180 °C and continue baking for another 20 minutes, moving the rack to the lower part of the oven if the top starts to brown too much. Remove from the oven and transfer the pan to a cooling rack. Brush the still-warm bread with the remaining pesto, about 50 g, as desired, then let it cool for 10 minutes in the pan before removing it and serving.

In collaborazione con Vaniglia Cooking