Tuesday, April 21, 2009

4 Star Chocolate Bread Pudding




Lauren of Upper East Side Chronicle (http://uppeeastsidechronicle.blogspot.com/) picked this week’s Tuesdays with Dorie recipe: Four Star Chocolate Bread Pudding. Check out her blog for the complete recipe. I had almost made this another time when I had leftover bread, but I had ended up making another bread pudding. My husband loves bread pudding but had never had a chocolate version.

When I was growing up, I was a part of Camp Fire Girls (now Camp Fire Girls & Boys). Every spring our council would have a canoe weekend at a local camp. Canoe weekend was a lot of fun, although here in Washington it was often rainy. Learning to use a canoe could be tough too, with all of the skills you have to learn to verify that you would know what to do if your canoe tipped over.

One thing I remember is that we had a great cook for canoe weekend. She was also a very thrifty cook and would use leftovers for other dishes, so nothing went to waste. She would always make bread pudding, so that was my first experience with bread pudding. I recall really liking it. I have had bread puddings since then, but I haven’t liked them too much. They are usually too soggy. I was hopeful that this wouldn’t be soggy.

This came together nicely. I used brioche buns. I bought them at Whole Foods and their breads don’t usually have preservative, so they get stale very quickly. Perfect for bread pudding! I made the custard and then used dark chocolate mini chunks for the bittersweet chocolate. I end up using those dark chocolate mini chunks for almost everything! The brioche soaked up all of the liquid and so I was hopeful that it wouldn’t be soggy.

I was pleasantly surprised that it was not soggy at all. The flavor was good, although it wasn’t the prettiest thing to look at! It was firm enough to cut, which was nice. I have to say that I have found a bread pudding that I liked, but it still isn’t my favorite dessert.

Recipe from Baking from My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan, pages 410 and 411.

7 comments:

chocolatechic said...

Looks good.

I am going to have to make a sauce for mine.

Amanda said...

I'm more of a vanilla custard bread pudding person myself, but I did enjoy this chocolate version. I added chocolate sauce in one helping and cream anglaise in another. Both were wonderful!

Unknown said...

How smart is that to use their bread! Awesome. I love the Girl Scout Story and the canoe thing I can so relate to. I also love that you had a thrifty cook! My kind of cook. Nicely done.

Heather said...

Looks good!!

Unknown said...

I agree - this one wasn't terribly photogenic! I thought it was wonderful. Glad you enjoyed it too even if it wasn't you favorite.

TeaLady said...

Glad it wasn't soggy, but sorry you didn't care for it. At least you tried it. Good for you.

Soy*Baby said...

Bread pudding is not my favorite dessert either. My grandma was a campfire girl and when I was young (grade school) she took me to a meeting to join and when we walked in she started singing the song really loudly. I was mortified as everyone stared at us. I never did join, but a canoe weekend would be cool.