Yummy Experiment #48: Challah Bread Pudding

One of my favorite books is The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking. This gem of a book allowed me to try bread making fearlessly. I’ve been wanting to try making challah, a pretty little braided bread, because the braiding looked simultaneously interesting and daunting. I finally made challah bread last Friday. Before I go on, here’s the disclaimer. . .

Acknowledgement: The full and original version of this recipe can be found in The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking. Feel free to visit their website artisanbreadinfive.com. In addition, I took the photographs from this post. If you think it’s nice enough to use, please let me know.

To make the Challah Dough, I mixed the following ingredients using my stand mixer, allowed it to rest for two hours then refrigerated it until the next day:

• 1 3/4 cups lukewarm water
• 1 tablespoon granulated yeast
• 1 1/2 tablespoon kosher salt
• 4 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 7 cups all-purpose flour

You’ll also need egg wash (1 egg beaten with a tablespoon or two of water) and sesame seeds for the top crust.

I only managed to get a picture of the final product.

Honestly though, I wasn’t very happy with this experiment. In fairness to me and the recipe, the challah tasted right. It just didn’t look right. The bread looked dry. Not sure if I over-mixed the dough with my Kitchen Aid stand mixer, but the dough did not rise as high as it usually would. After baking, I checked the yeast we have and proofed it to make sure it’s still active. It was. Goodness knows what went on. What’s more, braiding it was quite a challenge. Thank goodness there are YouTube videos on how to braid the challah!

So what did I do with the bread? Why, I made bread pudding! Here’s what you’ll need.

Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cups 2% low-fat milk
• 1/2 cup dried tart cherries – I didn’t have any!
• 1/2 cup golden raisins – Not to be found in our pantry as well.
• 1/2 cup fat-free sweetened condensed milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3 large eggs
• 8 cups (1-inch) cubes challah or other egg bread (1/2 loaf)
• Cooking spray
• 2 tablespoons sugar – Not clear whether to use granulated or confectioners sugar, but I used the latter.

You can find the complete and simple recipe that I tested here.

I mixed the milk, vanilla extract, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt and eggs in a bowl then added the cubed challah. I let it sit for about 30 minutes. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to remove the crust, so left it alone.

I transferred all the above ingredients to my baking dish then sprinkled some sugar. As I mentioned above, the recipe only said sugar. Maybe I should’ve used good ol’ granulated sugar, but oh well!

As stated in the recipe, I baked it at 325 F for about an hour.

The bread pudding was more successful than the challah bread, so yay! Out of the figurative “ashes” of that failed challah experiment, we ended up with a delicious dessert. No food waste!

This post contains affiliate links, which means I receive compensation if you make a purchase using the links in this post. All opinions are my own.