Mom's Day Bread pudding features apricots, cherries and caramel sauce

We’re back from a long vacation, just in time to celebrate Mom’s Day. Of course it wouldn’t be a holiday without some great food - a yummy feast topped off with some terrific desserts. Did we say bread pudding? Yowsa!
Today’s recipe arrived just in time to share with all our favorite moms. Who could resist this delightful pudding sent by Mary-Anne Durkee of California, who is one terrific cook and foodie, as well as a site editor for www.ifood.tv. and writer on cultures and cuisines for various media venues. This caramel-sauce-topped bread pudding recipe is chock full of dried apricots and cherries, two of our very favorite fruits. She found it in the October 1998 issue of Bon Appetit. In the user rating index, 100 percent say they'd make it again. Can’t get a much better endorsement than that.
Happy Mom’s Day to all!

BREAD PUDDING WITH DRIED APRICOTS, DRIED CHERRIES AND CARAMEL SAUCE

4 cups sugar
2-1/4 cups water
4 ounces dried apricots, thinly sliced
4 ounces dried tart cherries or dried cranberries
3 cups whipping cream
2 cups whole milk
8 large egg yolks
1-1/2 24-ounce loaves sliced white bread, crusts trimmed, each slice halved

Combine 1 cup sugar, 2 cups water, apricots and cherries in medium saucepan. Bring to boil, stirring until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat. Cover; let stand 20 minutes. Strain fruit; reserve fruit and soaking liquid separately.
Combine 1 cup sugar and remaining 1/4 cup water in heavy medium saucepan. Stir over low heat until sugar dissolves. Increase heat; boil without stirring until deep amber color, brushing down sides of pan with wet pastry brush and swirling pan occasionally, about 12 minutes. Remove from heat. Gradually whisk in 1 cup reserved soaking liquid (mixture will bubble vigorously). Stir over low heat until caramel thickens slightly, about 6 minutes. Add 1 cup cream. Bring to boil and simmer until caramel thickens slightly, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat. Cool caramel sauce 30 minutes, whisking occasionally. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover caramel sauce and fruit separately and refrigerate.)

Preheat oven to 350°F. Bring 2 cups cream and milk to simmer in another medium saucepan. Remove from heat. Whisk 2 cups sugar and egg yolks in large bowl to blend. Gradually whisk in warm milk mixture. Cool custard slightly. Lightly butter 13 x 9 x 2-inch glass baking dish. Arrange enough bread in single layer over bottom and up sides of prepared dish to cover completely, trimming bread to fit. Sprinkle reserved fruit over bread. Arrange remaining bread slices over fruit, trimming to fit and overlapping slightly.
Pour custard over bread. Press bread gently to submerge into custard. Let stand until custard is absorbed, about 10 minutes. Bake until custard is set and bread is golden brown on top, about 55 minutes.
Rewarm sauce over low heat. Serve pudding warm with sauce. Serves 8.
(Recipe from Bon Appetit , October 1998)

Chocolate bread pudding is always in season

So enough of the diet already! We’re sick and tired of watching our calories. We need CHOCOLATE. No frills or fancy stuff. Just any good chocolate will do. Preferably of the darker sweet variety, but hey we’re not picky – we’ll accept whatever falls onto our path. Or candy dish as the case may be.

And a very, although belated, Happy New Year to all my friends in Bread Pudding Land! Thanks so much to all of you who’ve contributed so many wonderful recipes and also made comments. To celebrate the New Year, and also our chocolate craving, here’s a recipe for chocolate bread pudding that swims in a scrumptious bourbon pecan caramel sauce. If we’re going to dive in, this is where we want to be. The pudding has almost a fudge texture. Need we say more?
Thanks to Pepe in New Orleans for suggesting this great bread pudding!

CHOCOLATE BREAD PUDDING WITH BOURBON-PECAN CARAMEL SAUCE

Sauce ingredients:
1-1/4 cups sugar
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup light corn syrup
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1-1/4 cups whipping cream
1 cup chopped pecans, toasted
2 tablespoons bourbon

Pudding ingredients:
2 cups milk (do not use low-fat or nonfat)
2 cups whipping cream
1 cup sugar
8 oz. Scharffen Berger 62% Semisweet Chocolate, chopped
8 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 (1 lb.) unsliced egg bread, crusts removed, trimmed, cut into 1-inch pieces

Directions for sauce:
Stir sugar and water in heavy large saucepan over medium heat until sugar dissolves. Mix in corn syrup and lemon juice. Increase heat and boil without stirring until syrup turns deep amber, brushing down sides of pan with wet pastry brush and swirling pan occasionally. Remove from heat. Pour in cream (mixture will bubble up). Stir over low heat until caramel is melted and smooth. Increase heat; boil until sauce is reduced to 1-2/3 cups, stirring often, about 4 minutes. Remove from heat. Mix in pecans and bourbon. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and chill. Rewarm before using.)
Directions for pudding:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Combine milk, cream, and sugar in heavy saucepan over medium-high heat. Stir until sugar dissolves and mixture comes to a boil. Remove from heat. Add chocolate; stir until smooth. Beat eggs and vanilla in large bowl to blend. Gradually whisk in chocolate mixture. Add bread cubes. Let stand until bread absorbs some of custard, stirring occasionally, about 30 minutes.
Transfer mixture to 13x9x2-inch dish. Cover with foil. Bake until set in center, about 45 minutes. Uncover, cool at least 15 minutes. Serve pudding warm or at room temperature with warm sauce.
(Recipe by Chef Alison Barshak, chef/owner of Alison at Blue Bell, a suburban Philadelphia bistro)

Caramel croissant bread pudding is quick fix

One amazing thing about the Internet is the number of friends you meet from all over the universe. Just plug a hobby (read obsession) into your browser, such as scuba diving, reading mysteries, or, as in my case, making bread pudding, and you have a bunch of fellow enthusiasts knocking at your door. Well, maybe not quite that close, but they’re at least within reaching distance of your computer keyboard.

One such friend is Kathy Jorgensen of California who I met while discussing cookbooks on CookbooksEtCetera, a cookbook collectors’ group on Yahoo. Soon we found we also enjoyed collecting recipes, including some scrumptious desserts, and she shared a recipe she had found for bread pudding made with croissants, bourbon, and an incredible sounding caramel sauce.

And, surprisingly, this pudding is a quick and easy dish for today’s busy cook, created by the popular British cook, Nigella Lawson, also known as the Domestic Goddess (gee whiz, why doesn’t anyone refer to me that way?). Lawson is noted for her hands on, not fussy cooking, and eating well when time is short.

I have to admit this one is in my “to try” pile, and I hope to get to it soon. And with Nigella as a source you can’t go wrong.

CARAMEL CROISSANT PUDDING
(from Nigella Express by Nigella Lawson)
2 stale croissants
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons water
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup whole milk
2 tablespoons bourbon (or rum)
2 eggs, beaten

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Tear the croissants into pieces and put in a small gratin dish; I use a cast-iron oval one with a capacity of about 2 cups for this.
3. Put the sugar and water into a saucepan, and swirl around to help dissolve the sugar before putting the saucepan on the burner over medium to high heat.
4. Caramelize the sugar and water mixture by letting it bubble away until it all turns a deep amber color; this will take 3-5 minutes. Keep looking but don't be too timid.
5. Turn heat down to low and add the cream-ignoring all spluttering-and, whisking in the milk and bourbon. Any solid toffee that forms in the pan will dissolve easily if you keep whisking over low heat. Take off the heat and, still whisking, add the beaten eggs. Pour the caramel bourbon over the croissants and leave to steep for 10 minutes if the croissants are very stale.
6. Place in the preheated oven for 20 minutes and prepare to swoon.
Serves 2 greedy people