Banana and Raisin Bread Pudding

I don’t often buy bakery goods.  I bake our bread and most of our treats, both because it’s less expensive to do so and because I like to know exactly what’s in the food we eat.   The one consistent exception to this rule is raisin bread.  Try as I might, my raisin bread never turns out as well as the stuff from the bakery. 

I’m okay with my raisin bread disability.  After all, we don’t eat it every day.  Life will go on even if I have to concede defeat once in a while and buy something from a commercial bakery.  I do resent paying more than $2.00 a loaf for any bread, though, so I’m always on the lookout for a sale price or discount.

Last week I found two loaves of raisin bread on the discount rack at the Superstore.  They were marked down 50% from their original price of $2.69/loaf because their sell-by date fell on the following morning.  The bread was still nice and soft so I bought it.  I put one loaf in the freezer for another day.  My husband made a couple of lunchtime sandwiches from the other loaf and I used the rest to make this bread pudding. 

I’ve been making Banana and Raisin Bread Pudding for so long that I can’t even remember where the original recipe came from.  (It’s one of the loose pieces of paper tucked into the back of my everyday cookbook, handwritten on the back of an old envelope.)  I don’t make it often but when we do have it we always enjoy it.  It’s comfort food: Warming, aromatic, and delicious. 

To make Banana and Raisin Bread Pudding, you’ll need:

• 1/4 cup butter
• 4 cups of 1-inch cubes of stale raisin bread
• 2 medium bananas, cut lengthwise and then sliced into 1/2-inch thick half-rounds
• 3 eggs
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 cups milk (I didn’t have fresh milk in the house so I used 1 cup of low fat evaporated milk and 1 cup of water.)
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons vanilla

Preheat your oven to 350˚ F.  Put the butter in a 2-quart casserole dish and put the dish in the oven until the butter melts.

Add the bread cubes to the melted butter and toss them until all the butter is absorbed into the bread.  Add the bananas and toss to distribute them evenly throughout the bread cubes.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl (I used the cup I’d measured the bread cubes in).  Add the remaining ingredients and whisk them together until the sugar is dissolved.

Pour the liquid mixture over the bread cubes and stir gently to distribute the spices through the entire pudding. 

Bake the pudding for 50 to 60 minutes, until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.  The pudding will look like this, and be slightly souffleéd. 

It will settle a bit as it cools.

There’s a debate in our house about how to serve this pudding.  My husband and I both agree that it should be served warm, but I prefer to eat my pudding plain, or with a little milk or cream.  My husband has more of a sweet tooth than I do, and likes his bread pudding topped with my grandma’s brown sugar sauce.  

Brown sugar sauce is easy to make and I always have the ingredients in my pantry so I’m happy to oblige him.

To make brown sugar sauce, you’ll need:

• 1 cup brown sugar, packed
• 3 Tablespoons all purpose flour
• 1 cup boiling water
• 2 Tablespoons butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Put the sugar and flour in a small saucepan and whisk them together until they’re well combined.  Break down any large lumps in the sugar with your whisk.

Stir the boiling water into the sugar mixture.

Heat the sauce over medium heat, stirring constantly, until it boils and thickens.  Remove the sauce from the heat and stir in the butter and vanilla extract until they’re entirely blended in.  

Serve hot.
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This post is linked to "Think Pink Sundays" by Flamingo Toes and "Delicious Dish Tuesdays" by Coping with Frugality.