Recipe: Challah Bread Pudding

Last Friday I was invited to a Shabbat dinner, so I made sure to bring challah so I wouldn't arrive empty handed. But I should have known that my good host would already have challah. So then I had a whole loaf of bread to myself. What was I going to do with it? Make bread pudding, obviously!

I found this recipe on the blog Live Well Bake Often. Sounded pretty easy, so I thought I'd try it.

Ingredients

• 1 loaf day-old challah bread cubed into 1-inch pieces
• 5 large eggs lightly beaten
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 4 cups whole milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Instructions

Bread cubes

1. Spray a 9x13 baking dish with nonstick cooking spray. Place the cubed challah bread into the prepared baking dish and spread it around into an even layer. Set aside.

The spices didn't completely blend in, but I think that's okay.

2. In a very large mixing bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar, milk, vanilla, nutmeg, and cinnamon until fully combined. Pour the mixture evenly over the bread in the prepared baking pan, making sure all of the bread is coated. Allow to sit and soak up the mixture for about 15 minutes.

Everything is mixed together and ready for the oven!

3. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350°F. Once the 15 minutes is over, place the bread pudding in the oven and bake at 350°F for 45-50 minutes or until the top is set.

4. Remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly before serving.

First of all, I did not read the entire blog post, just the ingredients list and the basic instructions. So I missed the part about slightly toasting fresher challah so that it will be a little dried out, which is ideal for bread pudding. I bought my challah on Friday afternoon and made the bread pudding on Sunday; while it was a few days old, it was not quite stale. But that didn't seem the matter: this bread pudding was delicious! I also didn't have any nutmeg, so I used allspice instead. It gave the bread pudding a bit of a chai flavor, which I actually really like. I would definitely make this recipe again!