Bread Pudding

I always wondered how this bread pudding tasted - the recipe always made use of stale bread and eggs with milk and spices together baked to a golden brown - served with ice-cream and some kind of sauce....... which was generally a bourbon sauce as bread pudding is a delicacy from the Southern States of America where bourbon and whiskey are loved plenty.
I had tasted this amazing bread pudding at our favorite restaurant "Bubba Gump" and had fallen in love with the bread, nutmeg and cinnamon together with that awesome sauce.
Had been wanting to recreate this dish for a long time - but, never came around to making it. The other day I had baked white bread at home and somehow it was not used up. Home made bread tends to get spoilt in 2 days. Hence had to use it up. That's when the hubby asked me to make this dish.
The recipe is a little bit from here, a little from there. Frankly, its the same recipe if you see it everywhere, just a teaspoon extra of this or a pinch more of that.

Ingredients

7 cups bread - bite size pieces of white bread or baguette
2 tablespoons butter - melted
2 cups milk
2 cups sugar - you can use brown sugar to get that brown color.
1 teaspoon cinnamon powder
1 teaspoon nutmeg powder
1/2 teaspoon allspice powder
4 eggs
1/2 cup black raisins
1/2 cup pecans - chopped

Method

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. On a cookie sheet spread the bread pieces and then cover the bread with the melted butter. Put this cookie sheet int he oven and get the bread a little crisp, say for 10 minutes. In the meantime - in a big mixing bowl take the milk, sugar, spices and eggs and mix well and make it into a custard. Add the raisins and the pecans and then the crisp bread to the mixing bowl and cover the bread with the custard mixture. Take a 13X9 baking dish and grease it. Now add the bread and custard mixture to it. Bake it in 350 degrees Fahrenheit oven for 45 minutes. If the top starts getting brown, just cover it with an aluminum foil and bake for the full 45 minutes.
Serve with vanilla ice-cream and chocolate sauce.

You can just add a bit extra zing to this pudding by soaking the raisins and the pecans in 1/4 cup bourbon for 24 hours (or more) and then use it to make the bread pudding. It will be a slight bit boozy and will have a southern kick to it.

Quick Guacamole (in the food processor)

It was one of those wintry February evenings when we were just too bored and were trying to think of what to do to make it a fun evening - the winter this year was too harsh and most of the times we were stuck inside the home.
So, it was going to be movie time with some chips and store bought salsa. But, then I saw this beautiful avacado that was sitting on my kitchen counter saying so lovingly....... pick me up.
So, we quickly whipped up this guacamole in the mini chopper (the handheld one) and savored it with some corn chips while watching Ice Age.

Ingredients

1 avocado
1/2 red onion
1/2 tomato
1 green chilli (you can add more if you want the heat)
juice of half a lemon
salt to taste
1/2 teaspoon black pepper (optional)
Chopped cilantro for garnishing (I did not have any cilantro and hence there is no garnish in the pictures)

Method

Cut the avocado, remove the seed and scoop the flesh into a mini chopper. To this add the onion, tomato and green chili, lemon juice, salt & peppers and mix in a pulse motion 5 to 6 times. Garnish with chopped cilantro. Savor with chips
Snack time - guacamole and chips.