Finally the brioche bread pudding

Tags

brioche, postaday2014

I had to put the bread pudding back in the oven once I cut into it because the custard hadn’t completely set, but I wanted to take a picture to show you the insides, the custard, the raisins and the orange zest. Actually thank goodness for my desire to show you a picture, because I would not have been aware that the custard wasn’t set all of the way if not for the need for a picture. I had planted a knife, but the knife was short, I didn’t notice, I was that rushed and in a hurry. It all came out alright in the end, the custard set, the babies loved it and so did I.

I am definitely going to make this again, it was a great comfort food type of dessert, perfect for the apres ski dinner scene. We are going to have it tomorrow for breakfast, a great breakfast to power ourselves up for ski.Tonight we had lasagna and tomorrow we’ll have it again for lunch when we come back home from our morning ski run.

It’s always so much fun to have my sister and my niece and nephew over for ski or for any old thing. Their puppy Harry came over to play with Jack.

They have been non-stop running, jumping and horsing around. They are going to sleep like babies tonight.

So there you have it, the end of the brioche saga. It ended very well. Hooray!

Part two in the brioche saga

Tags

baking, bread, brioche, cooking, postaday2014

Today was the day to see if all of my work in preparing and kneading the brioche dough was successful. After going out food shopping with my hubby for the lasagna ingredients and the rest of the bread pudding ingredients, I came home to start the tomato sauce and to bake the brioche. I had taken the dough out of the refrigerator before leaving and put it in a warm place to get a second rising and then I had gotten home, I had punched down the dough and shaped it into the loaf pan, brushed it with egg wash and off into a 350 degree oven for 35 minutes.

At this point, I couldn’t tell if it was going to turn out well or not. I was still nervous at this point and so I had 35 minutes to wait before I knew if my work was going to pan out. I was so happy to see a golden brown brioche when I opened the oven door. Here is the picture of the brioche just out of the oven.

Hooray, it looks pretty good and it is cooked all the way through, the knife came out clean. I called my hubby into the kitchen to look at it, he said that it looked a little weird, he was imagining something more grand I think, but no matter, I was impressed with it. Now my hubby asked me to turn it out of the pan, so that he could taste it.

He really, really liked it, I tasted it and it tastes light and buttery, perfect for the breakfast bread pudding tomorrow. All in all it isn’t too much work, it is more a question of timing than actual work, the resting time is the “tricky” part. It’s also a much stickier dough to work with than what I am accustomed to, what with the eggs and all of the butter. I will definitely make it again, now that I know what to look for and what it feels like as a dough. That is what I love about baking and cooking, always something to learn and it involves all of the senses, it isn’t a static or boring past time, it keeps me constantly engaged and interested.

Here is a picture of my tomato sauce, it’s about ready so I will be putting my lasagna together and tomorrow we will have lasagna to eat, always better the next day.

A first for me : Brioche dough

Tags

bread, brioche, postaday2014, pudding

http://www.instructables.com/id/Brioche-Dough-101/step2/Step-2-make-the-dough/

Today I am making brioche dough for the first time ever. I’ve made other types of yeast dough such as for croissants and raisin buns, but never for brioches. I don’t know why, I do know that I have had brioche on my mind for a few years now because it is intrinsic to a recipe that I have wanted to make for the longest time; a brioche breakfast bread pudding. The recipe comes from the Barefoot Contessa or Ina Garten and it sounds absolutely delicious for breakfast.

The occasion is because my sister and the children are coming Monday and staying until late Tuesday and I want to have a wonderful warm breakfast for Tuesday morning for my niece and nephew, and my sister. They are coming for skiing, after all the snow and the ski area just down the road; why not come over for two days of great skiing conditions?

Brioche dough needs to be made the day before which is why I made the dough this evening, so tomorrow I can shape the dough into my loaf pan and bake it. The bread pudding needs day old brioche bread so by Monday I will have everything ready to make the bread pudding. We can have it for Monday night dessert and Tuesday morning, I’ll warm it up for breakfast.

The bread pudding will be two layers of brioche bread with a sprinkling of raisins in between and a rich custard bathes the brioche slices, almost like French toast with a vanilla custard. I can’t wait to try it.

Before all that, I hope that the brioche dough rises and then I hope that the brioche bread tastes good. If that happens then we will be on our way to a wonderful bread pudding, all my hopes for success rest on my dough. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

I am nervous because I’m not sure if I kneaded it too much or maybe not enough, it was really sticky, seriously sticky and I added a bit more flour and still it was sticky, sticky. I finally got it to be smoothish and elastic, but it took an awful long time, my shoulder muscles were getting tired from lifting the dough up over itself, over and over again for at least twenty minutes. I really hope that it comes out fine, but even if it doesn’t, I will try again because practice makes perfect or pretty darn good.