This Chunky Cheddar Cheese Bread is soft and loaded with chunks of cheddar cheese, together with shredded cheese. Lightly flavoured with a bit of mustard and garlic and topped with sesame seeds.

homemade chunky cheese bread sliced on cooling rack

There’s cheese bread and then there’s cheeeeeese bread. This is definitely the latter. This is the bread you should make when you really want the full-on cheese bread experience. It’s excellent eaten out of hand, with butter. It’s great toasted or as a sandwich bread and of course, it makes a pretty much perfect grilled cheese.

This bread uses an interesting technique. First the dough is rolled out, then scattered with shredded cheese, then rolled up jelly-roll style. Then it’s cut in half lengthwise and then cut into little pieces. Those pieces are scattered haphazardly into the loaf pans, mixed with a generous amount of cheese chunks. It’s all topped off with a bit of melted butter, a pinch of garlic salt and a sprinkling with sesame seeds. It bakes up into a solid loaf, that’s very sliceable, with no gaps that you often get with just jelly-rolled cheese bread.

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Ingredients and Substitutions

Cheddar Cheese – while you can use any cheddar cheese here, I think an “Old” cheddar, either white or yellow, will give the best cheddar flavour.

Yeast – you can use Active Dry Yeast or Instant Yeast for this bread.

Recipe Tips

  • If you’ve ever gazed longingly at those super cheesy breads at the grocery store, then been stopped short by the price tag, you’ll be laughing all the way to the bank with this homemade version. You’ll use less than 1/2 of standard large block of cheese for these two loaves, so maybe $2.50 – $3 for cheese, tops – for two large loaves. With minimal other ingredients, it makes a lot of sense to bake your own, not to mention that you know exactly what’s in it!
  • When it comes to cutting the dough into small pieces, don’t be too precise with it. Go all ninja on it and just cut haphazardly. It’s good to have a variety of sizes and shapes, to fill in the pan spaces best.
  • Don’t be in too much of a rush to remove the bread from the oven. It will look fairly browned at the 30 minute mark, but it needs to cook a little longer (35-40 minutes). Cover loosely with a piece of foil to stop the browning, if needed.
  • Don’t skimp on the greasing of the loaf pans. It will make your life easier when removing the cooked bread later. I just use a generous spray of baking spray.

Chunky Cheese Bread

Love cheese bread? You might also like my Soft Cheese Bread recipe.

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homemade chunky cheese bread sliced on cooling rack

Get the Recipe: Chunky Cheddar Cheese Bread

A chunky cheddar cheese bread, both in appearance and in the use of a generous amount of cheese chunks.
4.96 stars from 23 ratings
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Prep Time: 2 hours 30 minutes
Cook Time: 40 minutes
Total Time: 3 hours 10 minutes
Yield: 24 servings

Ingredients

Bread:

  • 1 1/2 cups warm water, about 105° F.
  • 2 Tablespoons instant or active dry yeast
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 2 1/2 teaspoons salt
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons dry mustard powder
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1/4 cup vegetable oil
  • 2 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
  • 5-6 cups all-purpose flour

Filling:

  • 2 cups cheddar cheese , shredded and somewhat packed
  • 2 cups cubed cheddar cheese , cubed into 1/2 inch chunks

Topping:

  • 2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, or melted butter
  • Pinch of garlic salt and/or sprinkling of dried herb or spice mix
  • Sesame seeds

Instructions
 

  • Generously grease two 8x4-inch or 9x5-inch loaf pans and set aside.
  • In a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a kneading hook, combine warm water and yeast. Stir and let stand 2-3 minutes, until foamy. Add the sugar, salt, mustard, eggs, oil, butter and 3 cups of the flour. Mix together until combined. Begin adding more of the flour, in small increments (1/2 cup at first, then 1/4 cup, then tablespoons), until you have a moist, smooth and elastic dough. Remove dough to a greased bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Allow to rise until doubled, about 30-60 minutes.
  • Remove risen dough to a floured surface. Divide into two equal pieces. Roll one piece of the dough into a rectangle about 10x16-inches. Scatter one half of the shredded cheese evenly over top of the dough. Starting with the long side, roll the dough up jelly-roll style. Using a sharp knife, cut down the middle of each roll lengthwise. Then, using the knife, cut the two long pieces into smaller irregular pieces, about 1-inch-ish. Scatter about half the dough pieces onto the bottom of one of the prepared loaf pans. Scatter with 1/4 of the cheese cubes. Top with the rest of the dough pieces and then another 1/4 of the cheese cubes. Set aside and repeat this process with the same process with second dough piece, filling up the second loaf pan. Don't worry if it looks sparse. It will rise and all cook together wonderfully.
  • When both loaf pans are filled, drizzle with melted butter, dividing it between the two loaves. Sprinkle with a pinch of garlic salt (or dried herb blenand some sesame seeds. Cover with greased plastic wrap and set to rise 30-45 minutes, or until puffy.
  • Preheat oven to 350°F (regular bake setting/not fan assisted) Place loaf pan on a baking sheet (to catch any bubble-overand bake until well browned, 35-40 minutes. Check at 30 minutes. If top is brown enough, cover loosely with aluminum foil to stop additional browning and continue baking.
  • Allow to cool in pans for about 20 minutes, then run a knife around the outside and remove to a cooling rack to cool completely. These freeze well!

Notes

Be sure to read the notes above this Recipe Card, for more tips, options, substitutions and variations for this recipe!
Recipe adapted from Passion for Baking
Cuisine: American, Canadian
Course: Bread
Author: Jennifer Maloney
Serving: 1serving, Calories: 223kcal, Carbohydrates: 22g, Protein: 7g, Fat: 11g, Saturated Fat: 6g, Cholesterol: 37mg, Sodium: 365mg, Potassium: 52mg, Sugar: 2g, Vitamin A: 240IU, Calcium: 142mg, Iron: 1.4mg
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