IT’S HERE!! World Nutella Day has arrived! 5 years ago… Sara Rosso of Ms. Adventures in Italy had a dream… that EVERYONE would eat Nutella on the same day and thus… WND was born.  Fast forward a couple years and Michelle Fabio of Bleeding Espresso joined in on the dream.


The Dream: To eat, drink, or simply play with Nutella. From Pane e Nutella to Chicken Enchiladas with Nutella Mole Poblano.. all you have to do is do what you love…. with NUTELLA!


I love to bake and WND is the perfect way for me to practice and show off my baking skills.  Last year, I mentioned that I was still in a funk and couldn’t think of anything to make.  I was still in kitchen culture shock.  I’ve been here 2 years and I still have American ingredients in my kitchen so it was nice to finally get the apron on and get dirty.  I wanted to make something different for WND.  Something that hadn’t been done yet.  I browsed the WND site for recipes and last night.. it clicked.


So, this morning, I started off the day right… with the breakfast of champions…

I was already half way through my special secret WND plan when Carlo asked for his Marocchino.  So, I covered the inside of his coffee cup with nutella…

By the time I was ready to put my creation in the oven, I finally told Carlo (let him see) what I was doing.  I had made… NUTELLA MONKEY BREAD!  I had never made it before and to be honest, I liked making it from scratch.  Once we ate some of it, we decided that there were definite changed needed to be made so, I will post a revised version.  However, in the spirit of learning from our mistakes, I will also tell you what I did. 


I followed the recipe from Cooks.com.  I used the same ingredients except added more flour and mixed kept my wet ingredients together and the dry together, then mixed with an electric mixer.  Once the dough had risen (after 3 hours) I rolled up some balls and buttered the pan.  I didn’t have a bundt pan so I used a springform pan.  (I also wrap the outside in foil and I’m glad I did). 


I used some of the ideas from SmittenKitchen and dipped the balls into melted butter, then brown sugar and cinnamon.


I had the idea of adding bananas but in the end, it overpowered EVERYTHING.  Next time, I’ll omit that.  I also melted Nutella with heavy cream.  I was afraid the Nutella would be too strong but in the end, we wanted more! So next time, I’ll just melt it without the cream.


Overall, I liked it.. Carlo did not. (but then again.. it was the banana that did it for me)  I’ll try it again and hopefully the revised edition will be better.