Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread [w/ Cream Cheese Frosting]

My husband loves cinnamon bread.  During fall/winter/spring I usually make him some every other week.  It's easy enough to make, but I haven't conquered rolling the dough up so that there is a nice swirl of cinnamon/sugar throughout the entire loaf.  My husband's ok with that, but I'm always disappointed...

Then Joy the Baker blogged about Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread.  I figured there was no way to be disappointed for a couple reasons: if Joy posts it - it'll be phenomenal and if it contains cinnamon & sugar & butter dough smothered in cinnamon, nutmeg, sugar, and butter it's bound to have good taste throughout!

And, really, good doesn't even begin to describe how tasty this was warm from the oven and smothered with cream cheese frosting!  I consider this cinnamon bread meets cinnamon roll.  Mmmmm.

Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread [w/ Cream Cheese Frosting]
(Bread Recipe Adapted from Joy the Baker)

Dough:
1/3 cup milk (2%)
1/4 cup water
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 3/4 cup all purpose flour
2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast

Place ingredients in a bread machine in the order listed.  Turn machine on dough setting and walk away until the dough is done.  If you so desire you can head over to Joy's blog for instructions on how to accomplish this task by hand...though I love using the bread machine as it allows me to work on other things for an hour and a half while my dough is made!

Filling:
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons nutmeg
3 tablespoons melted butter

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl.

Cream Cheese Frosting (makes way more than enough to top your bread...store in the refrigerator for your next batch of cinnamon pull apart bread or use for pumpkin bars, carrot cake, etc):
1/2 cup butter
1 8-ounce package of cream cheese
1 lb powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Beat butter and cream cheese until light.  Add powdered sugar and vanilla.  Beat until smooth.

Now to actually prepare the bread for baking:

Roll dough out into large rectangle on a floured surface.  Pour melted butter on top of the dough.  Use a pastry brush or your fingers to distribute evenly over the surface.  Top evenly with sugar mixture.  Slice into six long strips of equal size.  Stack into two piles.  Cut each stack to create equal sized squares.  Place squares in baking pan on their side (so it looks like the pages of a book).  Cover with a towel and allow to rise until nearly doubled.

Bake in a 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes.  While still warm, pop bread out of baking pan.  Allow to cool slightly (though in my case that only meant about two minutes)!!  Eat as is or top each piece with cream cheese frosting.  Bread tastes just as delicious the second day if you heat it in the microwave for 30 seconds!