Roasted Garlic + Brie Pull-Apart Bread

A few weeks ago I bought some Brie cheese to re-make a pie I made a few years ago. For some random reason, I bought two triangles of cheese and only needed one for the pie. So when my Thanksgiving day meal planning was in its dawn, I contemplated what type of appetizer I could make that involved Brie cheese. I love Brie cheese. I love it in Mac and Cheese. I’ve made several iterations of Brie en Croute over the years. I’ve made a delicious breakfast bake that used Brie cheese. So delicious!

But I wanted something I thought of as different this year. I rolled around the idea of a pull-apart bread. I’ve seen tons of recipes on Pinterest but not a ton that actually involve Brie cheese. I settled on one from Life’s Ambrosia that also incorporated roasted garlic. Because why? Well duh. Who doesn’t love roasted garlic?

In my mind this appetizer was going to be a snap. In reality it was putzy. It may have been my bread knife. I’m positive it wasn’t the sharpest knife because I had a helluva time slicing the bread. Then I wasn’t paying attention to the directions which say to mix the melted butter with the garlic and I poured the butter into the bread, then read the directions more thoroughly. Whoops!

So I had to add the garlic after the fact. No matter. So there were big chunks of garlic randomly stuffed into my bread. No matter I tell you. Also I had to stick this into the oven with my turkey which was roasting at a lower temperature. So I upped the time on the bread.

The bread turned out good. Really good. I mean I wouldn’t have eaten half the loaf if it sucked. Ya know what I’m saying? But I thought the bread could have been more buttery. So I would suggest upping the butter amount in your recipe should you try this dish. I used 1/2 cup of butter which sounds like enough. But I promise you it’s not. Unless you’re using like a tiny loaf of sourdough bread (which I did not and you should not be either; see where the recipe calls for a large loaf?).

ingredients.

1 large sourdough boule
1 bulb garlic, roasted and cooled
8 T. butter
8 oz. double creme brie cheese, rind removed and cubed
2 T. chopped fresh parsley or 1 tsp. dried parsley, basil or oregano

directions.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Slice the bread in even slices from one side of the bread to the other stopping about 1/4 inch from the bottom of the loaf so that the bread is still attached at the bottom. Rotate the bread 90 degrees and repeat to make long cubes of bread you will eventually pull out and eat. Place on a sheet of aluminum foil. (You may need two.)
Melt the butter with roasted garlic cloves in a saucepan over medium-low heat.
Pour melted butter and garlic mixture over the top of the sliced sourdough, gently parting the bread to make sure the butter works its way down.
Press brie into the cuts of the bread. Sprinkle with (dried) herbs, if using.
Wrap the bread in aluminum foil and bake for 15 minutes.
Uncover and bake for 10 more minutes.
Remove from oven, sprinkle (fresh) herbs on top, if using. Serve immediately.

So while I was writing this I realized that last year at Thanksgiving I made an appetizer that involved bread and Brie, which I totally forgot about. And that appetizer was just lovely, in case you were wondering.