bread pudding

One of my all-time favorite dessert is bread pudding.  I usually don’t like sweets but recently I’ve found my weakness for bread pudding.  The delicious warm bread filled with chocolate sweet pudding, topped with vanilla ice cream, talk about good stuff.  When you bite into the warm pudding, it just melts into your mouth, the sweetness is overwhelming but the vanilla ice cream evens out the richness of the pudding.  It’s like a taste of heaven on your plate. 

            Before last week I had no idea of what bread pudding was and was not interested in trying it.  My brother on the other hand has more knowledge about the food world than I did (chef material), was in love with bread pudding.  I decided to give it a try because if he liked it then chances are I would too.  We were at Biaggis when I had my first experience with the bread pudding, and they knew how to make it.  The bread pudding was delicious and prepared just right, it was perfect, really good.  The bread pudding there was small, about the size of a small salad plate.  But it also came with ice cream so it wasn’t too bad.  The ice cream really evened out the richness of the sauce from the bread pudding.  Without the ice cream it was just a bit too much and too rich in flavor. 

            My expectations were high now for bread pudding.  Yesterday I went to Cheddars and they also served bread pudding, so I decided to try it.  When the server came out with the bread pudding, it looked good.  However when I started eating it, I was disappointed, the taste was not quite right.  The bread pudding was too mushy and chewy and there was just too much sauce.  I felt like I was eating a mouthful of chocolate and caramel syrup rather than the pudding itself.  The bread pudding was supposed to have a bit crunchy from the staled bread.  (Staled bread had to be used to make the bread pudding)   I only had a few bites of the pudding and it just fell apart.  It wasn’t as good as the breading pudding at Biaggis. 

            Since I was a picky eater, I decided to make my own bread pudding at home.  It may sound easy but it is a lot of work, and it takes time.  You have to make the sauce and the bread, but before you make the bread, you have to let the bread sit overnight to get that staleness.  The end result was impressive and I actually liked what I made.  Proving that what I blogged about a couple posts ago that, homemade is better.