Gingerbread can easily become Gingerbread Pudding. Why didn't we think of this before?
An AI-Generated Gingerbread House.
While shopping at my local Wegmans the day after publishing our Christmas Pudding essay, I noticed a display featuring loaves of gingerbread. But of course! Gingerbread pudding should be a no-brainer! And yet my google search revealed that it actually wasn't; all I could find were a few recipes for ginger-flavored bread pudding that essentially entailed making gingerbread from scratch while simultaneously making bread pudding. I knew we could do better... and easier.
GINGERBREAD PUDDING
First, the gingerbread... a nice and dense 1-pound loaf from Wegmans. (You can, of course, make your own if you choose.)
I cut this into one-inch slices, lightly toasted them (in lieu of intentionally aging them to firm staleness) and oh-so-carefully removed them from my toaster. (Using a toaster OVEN would work a lot better than the vertical model I used.) And another Pro-Tip: use the toasted pieces to identify the most perfect baking dish. You want it almost but not quite filled with the bread, like this--
Perfect fit. Now remove the slices and butter the dish. A covered casserole works great.
For the proper proportions of milk and eggs, I referred to the pumpkin pudding recipe our previous pudding essay. We're essentially pretending that we're making French Toast here.
6 Large Eggs
2 Cups Whole Milk
1 Cup (Light) Brown Sugar
Dash of Vanilla Extract
(Nothing else needed, as the gingerbread is wonderfully flavorful by itself. However, there is no reason you can't make this recipe your own with some added zing from your spice rack.)
Pre-heat oven to 350ºF.
Smear a thin layer of butter on the interior of your baking dish. Mix thoroughly and pour the milk & egg mixture over the bread. YOU DON'T NEED TO USE IT ALL! Rather, add about two-thirds of it and let the bread soak it up for an hour, covered with plastic wrap pressed tight to the bread. Then add a little more of the milk & egg mixture... for our test batch I wound up using all but a few spoonfuls.
Bake for about half an hour, checking periodically for firmness. The "Toothpick Test" from the previous pudding essay is useful here. Letting it sit in the oven after you turn off the heat ensures that it will cook thoroughly.
FINISHING TOUCHES
It makes sense, I suppose, to decorate your finished product as one would a Gingerbread Man Cookie, with icing and candy--
However, in the previous pudding essay I alluded to a "Brandy Sauce" that I had not yet figured out... one that does NOT include cornstarch, like all the recipes I was finding. After a little experimentation, here's what I came up with as the perfect brandy sauce for our gingerbread pudding--
In the kitchen, "brandy" doesn't mean the sweet stuff. Christian Brothers Brandy, our favorite inexpensive alternative to pricey Cognac and Armagnac, is perfect for sauces and eggnog.
Pour a wine glass's worth of good cooking brandy (Christian Brothers is our go-to) in a saucepan. Gently heat it up and then ignite it to cook off the alcohol. Add twice as much cream as the brandy and reduce while whisking, taking care to keep it from boiling over. When it starts to thicken, add a cup of brown sugar and a small dash of salt. Cut a quarter-stick of unsalted butter into small pieces and whisk in. A final dollop of crème fraîche completes the sumptuously rich flavor profile-- richness from the butter and cream, definitely sweet with a little counterbalancing saltiness, and an intriguing tang from the crème fraîche. Refrigerate and serve over microwave-warmed bread pudding... gingerbread or otherwise.
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