Bread pudding - a NOLA treat

As you may have gathered from past entries of this blog, I'm not much of a baker. I like to cook, but desserts are not my forte. But I do love bread pudding, and since I haven't found a good prepared one, I do bake one every now and then.

My tips:

• The bread must be stale. The best bread to use in this has no preservatives. True French bread does not; it's very crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. But really, any stale bread will do. I've used old hotdog and hamburger buns that were frozen for months.
• Beat the eggs and brown sugar well before adding the milk. Do not add cinnamon or nutmeg to the milk. It will separate. Much better to sprinkle the spices on the soaked cubes and stir.
• Make sure all the cubes have soaked. Mash them down to make sure they all get contact with the liquid.
• Do not try to skip a step and soak the pudding in the pan you cook it in. It will stick and stick badly.

I served this with a Bananas Foster topping at last night's dinner we cooked to raise money for our youth group's New Orleans mission. Click HERE for that recipe. It's pretty good without the rum, too. Full disclosure: I forgot the pudding in the oven and it cooked for a little more than an hour instead of 40 minutes. I skipped the browning step. It was still good, or at least people were kind enough to say it was. Also, everything marked optional was not in the bread pudding at that dinner. If you need a recipe that will serve 75, email me.


Lori K's bread pudding for 8-10

4 cups cubed day-old French bread (about a loaf)
3 eggs
3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
2 cups fat-free milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract (optional)
1/2 cup raisins
1/4 cup pecan pieces (optional)
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg (optional)
1 tablespoon butter (optional)

Preheat oven to 325°F. Spread bread cubes on a baking sheet and bake for about 10 minutes.

Whisk together eggs and brown sugar in a large bowl. Blend in milk and vanilla. Stir in the toasted bread and raisins (and nuts, if using). Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes, or up to 1 hour. When soaked, add cinnamon and nutmeg.

Meanwhile, lightly coat a shallow 2-quart baking dish with canola oil or nonstick cooking spray. Melt butter in a small saucepan over low heat. Skim off froth and cook until it begins to turn light nutty brown. If it burns, start over.

Pour the bread mixture into the prepared baking dish. Drizzle cooled browned butter over the top. Bake the pudding for 40 minutes, or until firm in the center. Increase the oven temperature to 425°F and bake for 10 to 15 minutes longer, or until the top is brown and puffed.

King Cake update

Photograph © Lori Korleski Richardson

Even a bad King Cake is pretty good. I used a recipe from nolacuisine.com, after ascertaining that the Epicurious one was way beyond my meager baking skills. It came out (to my taste) too dry and flat, and the pecan filling leaked out all over the cookie sheet, but the simple icing was a hit (1 cup powdered sugar to 1 tablespoon bourbon plus coloring). Yet even that I had trouble with; I got food coloring all over my fingers, and the blue seemed intent on overpowering any red I added to get a good shade of purple.

They say no one in New Orleans makes a King Cake; they all buy them from bakeries there. I now know why.

Oysters: Shelled out

In a perfect world, oysters would come straight from the estuary on ice, quickly shucked, a pat of flavored butter put on the oyster-on-the-half-shell sitting on a bed of rock salt, then put in the oven at 500 degrees for 12-14 minutes, or until lightly browned and bubbling: the quintessential Oysters Rockefeller, a dish named simply for its richness.

Alas, time and place were not perfect last night. The oysters were from a jar. Not having any shells, what to do? Well, I'm here to say that baked in an au gratin dish, Oysters Rockefeller are only slightly less stunning than their individual selves, and make a sumptuous dinner served over white fluffy rice. I followed the traditional recipe from "The New Orleans Cookbook" (Knoft, 1975, 264 pages) by Rima and Richard Collin, but since they were being served as a main dish rather than an appetizer, I made a few substitutions, namely more spinach and less butter. Sorry I didn't take a photo of it; the aroma was overpowering and we were hungry.

Oysters Rockefeller casserole

Serves 2

8 ounces select oysters, drained

2 cups packed raw spinach (about 5 ounces)

1/2 stick of butter, softened

2 tablespoons chopped parsley

1/4 cup green onions

1 tablespoon minced celery

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon ground white pepper

1/4 teaspoon dried marjoram

1/4 teaspoon dried basil

1/4 teaspoon cayenne

2 tablespoons Pernod or Absinthe

Preheat oven to 500 (or the maximum recommended temperature for your au gratin dish; mine was 480 degrees). Cook the spinach in the microwave until wilted but still bright green. Drain and dump it in the food processor. Add the rest of the ingredients and process until everything is small and well-blended.

Arrange the oysters in the bottom of the au gratin dish. Spoon the sauce over. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until the sauce is bubbling and lightly brown. Cool for 3-6 minutes. Serve over a bed of hot, fluffy rice.

A New Orleans breakfast

Brennan's in New Orleans serves an incredible brunch, and it has been one that I have used as a benchmark for all others. It was three courses, beginning with a rich, sherried turtle soup, followed by eggs Hussard, followed by bananas Foster, and accompanied by milk punch. I don't think I can get away with serving turtle soup in California, but I'm going to do my eggs Hussard for a crowd (the real thing requires poaching eggs; fine for a party of six but for more than a dozen, I prefer a strata base). I may substitute thick hot cocoa for the milk punch, unless someone wakes up needing the hair of the dog.

Eggs Hussard for 14

Plain Strata for Eggs Hussard
6 whole eggs and 1 dozen egg whites
4 cups milk
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 loaf of dry bread, torn up and crusts removed
Butter to butter pan with

Mix eggs, milk and salt well. Pour over bread. Soak overnight. Put in a buttered 9x13 pan.
Bake at 375 about 45 minutes until puffy and golden.
Top with 2 cups of marchand de vin sauce and 2-2/3 cups holandaise

MARCHAND DE VIN SAUCE
1/3 cup butter
3/8 cup onion
2 scallions
1 clove minced garlic
1/2 cup minced ham
1/2 cup chopped mushrooms
1/3 cup flour
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
2 cups beef stock
1/2 cup red wine
2 teaspoons thyme leaves
1 bay leaf
1/4 cup parsley, chopped
Salt and pepper

Melt butter in a large saucepan and sauté the onion, garlic, scallions and ham for 5 minutes. Add the mushrooms, reduce the heat to medium and cook for 2 minutes.
Blend in the flour and cook for 4 minutes, then add everything but the parsley. Simmer until the sauce thickens, about an hour. Remove bay leaves and put in fridge.

Reheat sauce slowly. Add parley before serving and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Blender Hollandaise
1 lb butter, melted
1 dozen egg yolks
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Blend the yolks, juice and pepper slightly in the blender or food processor. Turn the blender on high, then slowly add the melted butter. Cover, then pulse on for 60 seconds, off for 30 seconds, until the sauce thickens to the point that it does not drip down readily from a spoon. Do not reheat.