Milk Chocolate Cherry Twist

I am absolutely madly in love with the way this bread looks. As soon as I saw it in Canadian Living Baking I knew I had to make it, and I was thrilled with how it turned out. The dough itself was not my favourite, but then I've been spoiled by cinnamon rolls made with brioche and there's no turning back! So I would highly recommend you try out this recipe, and while this dough is easy to work with and fairly easy to make (and tastes like good white bread), I'd go for a brioche dough instead.

The recipe suggested using either cranberries, sour cherries or raisins and I went for cherries. Though I really love fresh cherries, dried cherries taste weird to me. In combination with the dried cherries were milk chocolate chips and pecans. I loved the pecans but the milk chocolate chips I used were the Ghiradelli ones, which I think taste awful and not completely like milk chocolate. What do you guys think of them? I love the bittersweet Ghiradelli chips though, and the semisweet ones are okay. Next time I'm thinking I'll try some kind of peanut butter/toffee filling. But regardless of what kind of filling you choose, or if you just want to use the regular cinnamon/sugar filling like for cinnamon rolls, preparing the dough the way this recipe suggests will give you a unique and irresistible presentation! Well any form of cinnamon roll is irresistible, but you know, more irresistible.

If this sounds good, you might also like:
Pecan Honey Sticky Buns
Golden Cinnamon Loaf
Soft Pretzels
Chocolate Dipped Cherry Shortbread

Milk Chocolate Cherry Twist
Adapted from The Complete Canadian Living Baking Book

I omitted the glaze and the icing. It's strange that the recipe is different in the cookbook than it is on the Canadian Living website. This is the cookbook version, using the stand mixer method for the dough.

Dough
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup butter
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup warm water
1 pkg active dry yeast (2 1/4 tsp)
2 eggs
3 1/2 to 4 cups all purpose flour (Ashley note: I used 3.5 cups, 510 grams.)

Filling
1/3 cup corn syrup
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup dried cherries
2/3 cup milk chocolate chips
1/3 cup chopped pecans
1 tsp cinnamon

Make the dough:
In small saucepan, heat together milk, all abut 2 tsp of the sugar, the butter and salt until butter is melted; let cool to lukewarm.

In mixer bowl, dissolve remaining sugar in warm water then sprinkle in the yeast; let stand until frothy, about 10 minutes. With paddle attachment, stir in milk mixture, eggs and 3 1/2 cups of the flour to make soft, sticky dough. With dough hook, mix on low speed for 8 minutes, scraping down bowl halfway through and adding enough of the remaining flour to make dough smooth and elastic.

Place in large greased bowl, turning to grease all over. Cover with plastic wrap; let rise in warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 1/2 hours.

Grease 10 inch spring form pan; set aside. (Ashley note: I used a 9 inch spring form pan.)

Make the milk chocolate cherry twist:
In bowl, mix corn syrup with brown sugar; stir in cherries, chocolate chips and pecans. Punch down sweet yeast dough; turn out onto lightly floured surface. Roll into 18x11 inch (45x28 cm) rectangle. Spread filling over dough, pressing into surface; sprinkle with cinnamon.

Starting at long edge, tightly roll up; pinch seam to seal. Place, seam side down, on work surface; cut in half lengthwise. Keeping cut sides up, twist halves together; place in prepared pan, shaping into ring. Pinch ends together to seal. Cover with clean tea towel; let rise in warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 350F. Bake in center of oven until golden, about 35 minutes. Run knife around edge of pan; transfer to rack. Let cool.