Pull-Apart Bread with Tomato Butter – Easy Recipe for BBQs

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This fluffy pull-apart bread with tomato butter is a delicious side dish for BBQs, picnics or family buffets. The simple yeast dough is spread with homemade tomato butter, folded and then baked until golden brown. And the best part: this tomato pull-apart bread is wonderful to bake with kids and can simply be pulled apart by hand afterwards.

This beautiful late-summer weather is the perfect excuse to make the most of it and fire up the grill one more time! And no BBQ is complete without some delicious bread!

Baguette, rustic bread, pretzels – my Minis are little “bread monsters.” But there’s one type of bread we’ve fallen particularly in love with: our homemade pull-apart bread.

This time, our pull-apart bread gets a wonderfully savory Mediterranean filling: homemade tomato butter.

For the tomato butter, we combine butter with tomato paste, sun-dried tomatoes and Italian herbs. We spread it over our fluffy yeast dough, cut the dough into strips and then fold them like little accordions.

The result is a wonderfully aromatic tomato pull-apart bread where everyone can simply pull off a piece once it’s baked.

And that’s exactly what my Minis love!

Why My Minis Love Pull-Apart Bread

It’s actually quite simple: my Minis get to “pull apart” their own bread.

That might sound like a small thing, but somehow it makes our pull-apart bread with tomato butter much more exciting for kids. Everyone can simply take as many pieces as they want to eat. And especially for younger children, that’s a lot of fun!

And it’s incredibly practical, too. When we’re having a BBQ, we simply put the pull-apart bread with tomato butter on the table and everyone helps themselves. We also love taking pull-apart bread on picnics because the individual “folds” make it easy to portion by hand. No knife needed!

Our pull-apart bread with tomato butter has a wonderfully Mediterranean flavor and tastes especially delicious with grilled food, salads or simply on its own as a savory snack.

What Exactly Is Pull-Apart Bread?

In German, pull-apart bread is often called Zupfbrot or Faltenbrot . The name already gives away what makes this bread so special: instead of simply shaping the yeast dough into a loaf, we roll it out, spread it with a delicious filling and then cut it into individual strips.

The strips are folded and placed next to each other in a loaf pan. As the bread bakes, the individual pieces of dough grow together, but they can easily be separated again afterwards – or rather, pulled apart! For kids, that’s obviously both easy and fun.

Pull-Apart Bread with Tomato Butter – Perfect for BBQs

For me, pull-apart bread is a great alternative to classic baguette when we’re having a BBQ. You can prepare our pull-apart bread with tomato butter before your BBQ and then simply place it on the table on a board or right in the loaf pan. Thanks to the tomato butter, the bread is already wonderfully flavorful and doesn’t need an additional spread.

It tastes especially delicious with:

• grilled vegetables,
• salads,
• meat or vegetarian BBQ dishes,
• antipasti,
• dips,
• or simply eaten straight from your hand.

And if there actually happens to be any left over, our pull-apart bread still tastes delicious the next day.

Recipe for Our Pull-Apart Bread with Tomato Butter

For our tomato pull-apart bread, we first prepare a simple yeast dough. While the dough is rising, we can make the tomato butter together. Then we combine the two, transforming a simple yeast dough into our delicious pull-apart bread.

 

Ingredients for the Yeast Dough

• 650 g spelt flour
• 300 ml handwarm water
• 50 ml olive oil
• 7 g dry yeast (1 packet)
• 1½ tsp salt
• 1 pinch of sugar

Ingredients for the Homemade Tomato Butter

• 125 g soft butter
• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 50 g sun-dried tomatoes in oil, well drained
• 1 tsp Italian herbs, such as oregano or basil (fresh basil tastes wonderful too)
• a little salt
• optional: 1 small garlic clove

Mini-Tip If your Minis aren’t big fans of garlic, you can simply leave it out. Even without garlic, the tomato paste and sun-dried tomatoes give the butter a wonderfully savory flavor.

Baking accessories

2 mixing bowls, hand mixer with dough hooks or your hands, kitchen towel, rolling pin, cutting board, kitchen knife, fork or spoon, butter knife and a loaf pan lined with baking paper.

How to Make Pull-Apart Bread with Tomato Butter

This recipe can easily be divided into several steps. If you’re making the pull-apart bread with kids, for example, you can prepare the yeast dough the evening before and leave it covered in the refrigerator to rise overnight. The next day, you can make the tomato butter together, roll out the dough and fold your pull-apart bread. This makes the recipe nice and relaxed, even when you’re preparing it for an afternoon BBQ.

Prepare the Yeast Dough for the Pull-Apart Bread

• First, we prepare our yeast dough because it needs some time to rest and rise afterwards. Mix the spelt flour, dry yeast, sugar and salt together in a large mixing bowl.
• Now your Minis can add the lukewarm water and olive oil. Make sure the water really is only lukewarm and not hot, otherwise the heat can prevent the yeast from working properly.
• Now it’s time to knead! Knead all the ingredients for several minutes until you have a smooth yeast dough. You can use the dough hooks of a hand mixer or stand mixer – or simply knead the dough together with your hands. Kneading is, of course, one of the jobs my Minis particularly enjoy.
• Cover the finished yeast dough with a clean kitchen towel and leave it to rise in a warm place for about 1 hour, until it has visibly increased in size. Alternatively, you can cover the dough and let it rise overnight in the refrigerator.

Is Your Yeast Dough Not Rising?

Don’t panic! Yeast dough was a bit of a mystery to me for a long time, too. Sometimes it rose beautifully, and sometimes it seemed as though absolutely nothing was happening. After lots of trial and error, I’ve collected a few tricks that now help me get reliable results with yeast dough.

How to Make Homemade Tomato Butter

While our yeast dough is happily growing, it’s time to take care of the real star of our pull-apart bread: the tomato butter!

• Make sure your butter is nice and soft. It’s best to take it out of the refrigerator in plenty of time.
• Drain the sun-dried tomatoes well and then chop them as finely as possible.
• Place the softened butter, tomato paste, finely chopped sun-dried tomatoes and Italian herbs or fresh basil in a small bowl.
• If you like garlic, you can finely chop or crush a small garlic clove and add it as well.
• Mix everything thoroughly with a fork.
• Finally, taste the tomato butter and season with a little salt if needed.

And just like that, your homemade tomato butter is ready!

Can I Prepare the Tomato Butter in Advance?

Of course! You can easily prepare the tomato butter ahead of time and keep it covered in the refrigerator until you need it. Just remember to take it out of the refrigerator in plenty of time before spreading it over the yeast dough. The butter should be soft and easy to spread. That makes it much easier to distribute over the dough – and even little hands can do a wonderful job of it.

Spread the Tomato Butter over the Yeast Dough

• After about an hour, our yeast dough should have visibly increased in size. Knead it briefly once more and then roll it out on a lightly floured work surface into a square measuring approximately 50 × 50 cm / 20 × 20 inches. Rolling out the dough feels a little like making cookies – so naturally, it’s a job my Minis are more than happy to take on.
• Now spread the softened tomato butter evenly over the entire yeast dough. And don’t worry if things get a little messy! After all, we’re baking with kids, not taking a baking exam.

Fold the Tomato Pull-Apart Bread

Now comes the step that turns our yeast dough into a real pull-apart bread.

• Cut the dough covered with tomato butter into strips approximately 4 cm / 1½ inches wide.
• To make the strips easier to fold, you can cut the long strips in half again.
• Fold each strip two or three times like a little accordion.
• Grease your loaf pan or line it with a sheet of baking paper and loosely place the folded pieces of dough next to each other inside. Nothing needs to look perfect! Quite the opposite: the differently folded pieces of dough are what create the characteristic texture of our pull-apart bread.
• Once all the strips are in the pan, leave the yeast dough to rest for another 10 minutes.

Bake the Pull-Apart Bread

• Place the loaf pan in the cold oven and set the oven to 200°C / 390°F conventional heat. While the oven is heating up, our yeast dough can continue to rise a little.
• Bake the pull-apart bread for approximately 30–35 minutes, until beautifully golden brown. Since every oven bakes a little differently, check towards the end of the baking time to make sure the bread is completely baked through.
• After baking, leave the finished pull-apart bread with tomato butter to cool in the pan for about 10 minutes before removing it.

And then? It’s time to pull it apart!

Preparation in pictures

Baking Pull-Apart Bread with Kids

I particularly love this recipe for baking with kids because there are so many different jobs they can help with.

The Minis can:

• weigh the ingredients,
• mix the flour, yeast and salt,
• add the water and olive oil,
• knead the yeast dough,
• watch the yeast dough rise,
• mix the ingredients for the tomato butter,
• roll out the yeast dough,
• spread the tomato butter over the dough,
• fold the strips of dough, and
• place the individual pieces into the loaf pan.

Depending on your child’s age, you can of course take over some of these tasks. When cutting the sun-dried tomatoes and strips of dough in particular, you should decide whether your Mini can already safely handle an appropriate knife.

What Do Kids Learn When Baking Pull-Apart Bread?

Baking together isn’t just fun. While weighing and measuring the ingredients, the Minis naturally encounter numbers and quantities. Kneading, rolling, spreading and folding help them practice different movements and develop their fine and gross motor skills.

One thing I find particularly fascinating about yeast dough is watching the dough change. Before it rises, you can take a look together at how big your ball of dough is. And an hour later? Suddenly, it’s much bigger! Why did that happen?

And just like that, you’ve started a little kitchen experiment along the way.

That’s exactly what I love about baking with my Minis: we don’t just make delicious things together – we also keep finding little opportunities to discover, experiment and do things ourselves.

Can I Prepare the Pull-Apart Bread in Advance?

Yes. If you want to serve the pull-apart bread with tomato butter at a BBQ, you can easily prepare part of the recipe ahead of time. For example, you can make the yeast dough the evening before and leave it to rise overnight in the refrigerator. The tomato butter can also be prepared in advance. The next day, all you need to do is roll out the dough, spread it with tomato butter, cut it, fold it and bake it.

That way, you can enjoy freshly baked pull-apart bread without turning the entire kitchen upside down right before the BBQ.

What Goes Well with Tomato Pull-Apart Bread?

Tomatoes, olive oil and Italian herbs give our pull-apart bread a wonderfully Mediterranean flavor. That’s why it tastes especially good with summery dishes and, of course, at a BBQ. We love serving it with salads, grilled vegetables and different dips.

But actually, our pull-apart bread with tomato butter doesn’t necessarily need anything on the side. It tastes best when it’s still slightly warm and you pull that first fluffy piece straight from the pan. At least, that’s what my Minis think. 😉

Pull-Apart Bread with Tomato Butter – Our Easy Bread for BBQs

Golden brown on the outside, beautifully fluffy on the inside, with our flavorful homemade tomato butter tucked between the individual layers of bread. For me, our pull-apart bread with tomato butter is a wonderful family recipe for summer. It’s perfect for BBQs, picnics or buffets and is a great recipe to prepare together with kids.

And the most important thing from my Minis’ point of view: You don’t need a knife. Just grab a piece, pull it apart and enjoy! If our pull-apart bread with tomato butter has given you a taste for more, you’ll also love our pull-apart bread with homemade herb butter.

I hope you and your Minis have lots of fun kneading, spreading, folding and, of course, pulling apart your bread together!

Yours, Lia

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