Cheesy Pesto Pull-Apart Bread
The whole loaf on a wooden board, cheese still bubbling in the cracks, tomato dip alongside, and the kitchen smelling of warm garlic and basil.
Ingredients
Serves 6- 1large sourdough loaf, about 800g
- 4 tbspbasil pesto
- 150 gmozzarella, torn
- 80 gcheddar, grated
- 50 gbutter, melted
- 2cloves garlic, crushed
- Fine salt and black pepper
Method
- Heat the oven to 190°C/170°C fan. Sit the loaf on a board and, using a serrated knife, cut a deep grid across the top; go almost to the base but not through it, so the loaf holds together as one piece.
- Stir the crushed garlic into the melted butter with a good pinch of salt and a few twists of pepper. The garlic only cooks through inside the bread, so it needs to go in raw and finely crushed; any larger and it scorches against the crust before the cheese melts. Watch it in the oven; if the top starts going past pale gold too fast, cover loosely with foil.
- Brush the garlic butter generously into every cut, letting it soak down into the bread. Spoon the pesto into the cuts next, working it down with the back of the spoon so it reaches the base of each crevice.
- Stuff the torn mozzarella and grated cheddar into every gap until the loaf looks properly loaded. Taste a pinch of the cheddar against the pesto on your finger; if it needs another whisper of salt over the top, add it now.
- Wrap the loaf loosely in foil, set it on a baking tray and bake for 15 minutes; the foil traps steam so the cheese melts through the middle before the crust hardens. Open the foil out and bake for a further 10 minutes, until the cheese is bubbling in the cracks, the cheddar on top is deep golden, and the crust has crisped at the edges.
- Slide the loaf onto a wooden board.
Per serving
- kcal
- 568
- protein
- 24.3g
- fibre
- 5.6g
- carbs
- 68.4g
- fat
- 21.4g
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