Your Monkey Bread Needs Pizza

You heard me right. Monkey bread, but make it pizza. Though you might be familiar with the sweet, sticky version of the tear-and-share bread, it’s actually the perfect vehicle for delivering all the flavors of pepperoni pizza to your mouth—I’d even argue it’s more fun to eat than your classic slice of pizza pie.

When ATK Kids Deputy Food Editor Afton Cyrus developed this Tear-and-Share Pepperoni Pizza Rolls recipe for The Complete Baking Book for Young Chefs, she made sure to get all those signature pepperoni pizza flavors in individual bite-size rolls. The result? Cheesy, garlicky, pepperoni-filled pizza bombs ready to be dunked in a pool of pizza sauce.

The recipe starts with taking a pound of pizza dough (homemade or store-bought), cutting it into small pieces, and patting the dough pieces into 3-inch rounds. For the filling, we put a slice of pepperoni on each dough round and top it with shredded mozzarella and another pepperoni slice, creating a pepperoni-mozzarella “sandwich.” This novel technique helps seal the cheese inside each roll, preventing any cheesy blowouts as the rolls bake. 

Then, seal up your rolls, let ‘em rise, brush them with an easy microwaved garlic oil, and sprinkle them with Parmesan before tossing them in the oven. Melty cheese? Check. Meaty pepperoni? Check. Tender bread and garlicky, cheesy crust? Check, check. 

We love to serve these rolls with warmed pizza sauce (again, homemade or store-bought), though I would also dunk them in two other sauces I love to drizzle on pizza: ranch dressing and buffalo sauce.