Nutella Pull-Apart Muffins – Homemade dough is layered with Nutella hazelnut spread and baked in a muffin tin and finished with a cinnamon glaze to make mini pull-apart muffins that are just as fun to eat as they are delicious!

Nutella and I are starting to become good friends. I’ve always loved it, but not in the obsessive-gotta-have-it way that many people are. But slowly but surely, it’s starting to win me over. 

My introduction to Nutella came in my childhood, when my dad would spread it on bread and make a sandwich, sometimes adding some peanut butter. I then took that novel idea and took it another step forward. During my college years, I frequently enjoys a snack of Nutella spread on buttered toast with a few sliced strawberries placed on top.

In recent years, I’ve started using Nutella in my baking adventures. First, I made these Nutella macarons. Then came my favorite cupcakes of all time – these Nutella crunch cupcakes. This is the recipe that really turned me into a Nutella fan. 

Now, I’m using Nutella in a whole new way by baking it in between layers of yeast dough and molding the dough into individual little muffins. Take a look at my Nutella Pull-apart Muffins!

This recipe was inspired by the chocolate babka, which is a loaf of bread baked with chocolate in the center. I’d been asked to make this in the past but just wasn’t on board with the idea of chocolate and bread. I know, I know. It seems like it’s something that I would immediately love but, most times, the chocolate was too rich and just didn’t pair well with bread. 

Nutella, however, was just the right texture and flavor to pair with the bread, in my opinion. It’s sweet and creamy and nutty and incredible. So I decided to finally attempt a chocolate bread recipe. Let’s talk through how that recipe goes. 

How to make this recipe

Ingredients

There are three main parts to this recipe: the dough, the filling, and the icing. The dough is a basic sweet yeast dough – the same that is used in my monkey bread and all my yeast doughnuts. The filling is simply just Nutella spread. Finally, the icing is a cinnamon glaze made from powdered sugar, milk, and cinnamon. I’ve found that cinnamon pairs incredibly well with chocolate so I saw this as an opportunity to add a little spice to this recipe. 

Process

To make this recipe, you’ll start with the dough. It takes about 1.5 hours to rise so you’ll want to give yourself enough time to get this done. Once the dough has risen, you’ll roll it out into a large rectangle and then spread on the Nutella. Next, you’ll cut the dough into 48 even rectangles and stack the rectangles into 12 stacks of 4 rectangles. Each stack will be placed into a muffin cup within your muffin pan. Make sure the stacks are standing up vertically so that they can expand outward while they bake. 

Once the muffins are formed, they need to rise again for another 30 minutes to get them beautifully fluffy. Then, they are baked until golden brown and finally covered with the cinnamon glaze to finish them off. 

Tips & Tricks

1. Nutella is a little hard to spread at room temperature. Therefore, I recommend heating for 15 seconds in the microwave to thin it out a little bit and make it easy to spread.
2. When making dough, it is very important that you take the time to knead it properly. You can either knead with a stand mixer or by hand. I like to knead by hand so I can tell how the gluten is developing. You’ll know when you’ve kneaded enough when the dough is soft and elastic, about 6 minutes. 
3. When forming the muffins, you will get Nutella all over your hands. It’s inevitable. As someone who hates getting their hands dirty, this was hard for me to accept. But once I did, I could just focus on making the muffins and let go of the fact that my hands were covered in gooey chocolate. 
4. Make sure to let the muffins cool for 5 minutes before adding the glaze. The glaze will melt all over the place if the muffins are piping hot straight from the over. Letting them cool for a few minutes will help the glaze stay on the muffins a little better. 

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More recipes you’ll love:

Apple Cinnamon Monkey Bread

Nutella Crunch Muffins

Nutella Macarons