Apr
Bread-and-butter pudding with caramel sauce
I had people around for dinner on the weekend and decided that bread-and-butter pudding would be good for dessert.
I went looking for a recipe and, as is my usual practice, ended up combining a few recipes to make one that I was happy with — I hate doing that whole bain marie thing, so I wanted to be able to just cook it in the dish I was going to serve it in.
Here’s what I came up with and it turned out a triumph. Unfortunately, I didn’t take a photo, so we’ll just have to have it again so I can add a pic to this post. Ah well, a dirty job, but I don;t mind taking a hit for the team.
Ingredients
8 slices of stale bread (you can substitute croissants, brioche or panettone for the bread if preferred, but they are probably a bit too rich if you plan to serve the pudding with the caramel sauce below)
6 large eggs
350ml cream
250ml milk
Dash of vanilla (to taste)
1/3 cup sultanas
Castor sugar (add 1/4 cup of caster sugar to the custard mix for sweetness if you don’t plan to serve the pudding with the caramel sauce)
Method
1. Preheat oven to 195C. Grease a medium-sized baking dish (or line it with baking paper if it’s not a very sturdy dish to avoid it overcooking on the bottom and sides and then grease the paper). Lightly butter the bread slices on both sides.
2. Put eggs, cream, milk and vanilla in a large mixing bowl and whisk until combined. Add buttered bread slices to the mixture, pushing them doewn into the liquid. Cover and refrigerate for around 30 minutes until bread has absorbed some of the mixture.
3. Arrange half of the bread slices on the bottom of the dish, tearing slices where necessary to cover the base. sprinkle half of the sultanas over the bread slices, then pour over about one-third of the liquid. Add remaining bread slices in the same manner as before and sprinkle the remaining sultanas, pour over remaining liquid and dust with caster sugar.
4. Cook in the centre of the oven for 30-40 minutes until top is golden brown and the custard is firm. Serve with caramel sauce.
Caramel sauce
Melt 100g of butter in a saucepan. Add 1 1/3 cups of brown sugar and stir constantly until the sugar is melted and the mixture begins to caramelise. Add 1 1/3 cups of cream slowly, stirring constantly over a low heat until the caramel sauce starts to thicken. Decant into a heatproof jug for serving.
Tags: bread and butter pudding, caramel sauce, dessert, pudding