Caramel Bread Pudding

Are you the one who always skips the first slice of the loaf of a bread, that thick crusty piece? If yes, then welcome to the club. Ever since I can remember I always ignore the first slice & the last slice of the loaf, to have the rest. And I always thought someone else would finish those slices.

But recently this has started to bother me, since I'm actually wasting food. And I don't like it at all, neither did Danny. Most of the times he is the one whose finishes those last slices, but at times when he doesn't bother to eat those, it just goes to waste. If at all I had any ideas to make use of those crusty slices.

And  then recently,while I was surfing through the TV Channels, I saw Nigella Lawson cooking up Caramel Croissant Pudding... 

Now talking about Nigella Lawson, she must be one of the best exports of Britain along with The Beetles, The Spice Girls, Bond Movies and all things British. I came to know about her cooking shows  recently while I was in India. And I was hooked. She makes us feel  that cooking is a really simple process,even thought its not.

So when I moved to US, after marriage, I tried looking for her episodes on food network channel. We had Paula Deen, Ina Garten and Guy Fiery, but no Nigella. I think the only time they aired her show was on Saturdays at 6 or 7 in the morning and I didn't want to lose my sleep for that. Anyways once we moved to UK, she was on almost all the food channels here.

 While Nigella made her pudding with croissant, I used leftover bread (read: slices which I never eat). I glammed  it up a little by toasting the slices with butter. Also I omitted adding bourbon(kind of liquor) since Aaron too will be having this. The end result was predictably good. (Obviously, with bread,butter,sugar,milk and eggs in a single recipe, it will never tastes bad, ever).

Caramel Bread Pudding

Recipe adapted from Nigella Express

1. Bread – approx 4-5 slices

2. Butter, room temperature - enough to spread on the slices and to butter the baking dish

3. Sugar - 100 gm

4. Water - 2 tbsp

5. Heavy/Double cream - 125 ml

6. Milk - 125 ml

7. Eggs,beaten - 2 medium

1. Preheat the oven to 180 C/350 F/gas mark 4.

2. Spread butter over both sides of bread slices.

3. Heat a pan and toast the bread slices, both sides till golden brown.

4. Tear the bread slices and put in a small glass dish of 500 ml capacity. I used 2 small oval baking dishes,of 250 ml capacity
5. Combine milk and cream in a saucepan and heat the mixture till it is just heated through.

6. Put the caster sugar and water into another saucepan, and swirl around to help dissolve the sugar before putting the saucepan or a small pot over a medium to high heat

7. Caramelize the sugar and water mixture by letting it bubble away until it all turns a deep amber colour; this will take 3-5 minutes. Don't stir at this stage since it may become lumpy.

8. Once its deep amber in color, turn heat down to very low and add the cream and milk and whisk continuously. Be very careful in this step since adding cream will make the entire caramel solution splatter.

9. Remove from heat and whisk further so that no lumps are remaining and keep aside to cool a bit.

10. Add this mixture to the beaten eggs.
11. Pour the caramel custard over the croissants and leave to absorb for 10 minutes.

12..Place the pudding in the oven for 20 minutes. Once done, allow to cool a bit, before serving.

Caramel Bread Pudding is ready to serve.

Depending on the appetite, one person can finish it off or can share it with upto 4 people.

Notes to Remember

* Always keep an eye over caramel all the time,otherwise it will burn in seconds.

* Be very careful while making the caramel and while pouring milk and cream to the caramel since it splatters very vigorously and may cause burns.

This pudding is one of those recipes, where your effort is really less, but pay off is huge. While I'm not bothered about the leftover bread once I tried this, I'm now bothered about the addictiveness to this pudding :-)