Donna Hay's Brioche Loaf and My Bread & Butter Pudding

Over the weekend I was going through Donna Hay's book 'A Cook's Guide' in the hopes that some of that magical food styling mojo would rub off. Unfortunately, food styling prowess can't be transferred by osmosis so I consoled myself with making (and eating) Ms Hay's truly excellent Brioche.

Now I only have a couple of photos of the full loaf as I had a ravenous family waiting in the wings to demolish this for breakfast. Also, I was super lazy and really didn't want to wake up at an ungodly hour on a Sunday morning for bread so I made the dough the night before and let it rise on the counter overnight. It's winter here in Perth so it was cool enough that the dough didn't over prove. I would normally prove overnight in the fridge but this dough has an obscene amount of butter in it that when I did put it in the fridge it just turned rock solid!

I won't post the recipe here but I will say that 'A Cook's Guide' is an gorgeously illustrated collection of classic recipes and I would definitely recommend it as a useful addition to any cookbook library. 

Once thing about the brioche is that it unfortunately does not keep well. It is definitely at it's best, fresh out of the oven. So a few days later, we still had around a third of the loaf kicking about the kitchen so I thought I'd refresh it a bit by turning it into a mini bread & butter pudding. 

See the recipe after the jump!

Bread and Butter Pudding

Here I've given amounts for a full size pudding, using a full loaf of brioche. This also works better if your brioche is slightly stale as it sucks up more liquid and becomes that much more luscious when baked. I served the pudding with some frozen raspberries (which thawed out just enough with the heat of the pudding) but any other soft fruit would work too. 

Ingredients:

750g loaf of stale brioche, shop bought or homemade

Butter, to spread over the bread

4 eggs

150ml cream

250ml milk

1 tsp vanilla paste

1/2 tsp cinnamon

Demerara sugar to top

Method:

Slice the crusts off the brioche (the crusts can over brown in the oven and lend a bitter taste to the pudding) and slice into 1.5cm thick slices. Butter each slice on both sides and arrange in an appropriately sized baking dish. 

Mix together the eggs, cream, milk, vanilla and cinnamon in a jug and pour over the buttered bread, making sure each slice is covered. Preheat oven to 150 degrees Celsius. Let the pudding to stand for 15 - 20 min to give the custard mixture time to absorb into the bread. Sprinkle with Demerara sugar and bake for 20 - 30 min or until the pudding is just set.

Serve hot with soft fruit and cream. 

Over and out!