Delightful Bread Pudding – not to be confused with its richer cousin, bread and butter pudding – is another way to use up stale bread.
As my Grandad pointed out to my Mum, the addition of dried fruit, butter, sugar, eggs and spices makes it a very expensive way of using up cheap stale bread, but it is delicious and filling. Just the thing to plug the vast, bottomless hunger hole that inhabits the space between coming home from school and eating dinner.
Speaking of children, this is a really good recipe for kids to make – the tearing of bread is laborious, but passes more quickly with someone chatting to you, little hands are good at squeezing water from soggy bread and they can beat it half to death with a wooden spoon because you can’t overmix bread pudding.

Interestingly, Grandad’s recipe book lists the recipe as a hot pudding to be eaten with custard, but we never ate it this way; no, it’s strictly left to cool and cut into slabs to be devoured as you would a piece of cake. A very substantial piece of cake, mind you, but still that’s our eating method of choice.
Yes, it’s a good rainy day recipe and it’s decidedly Autumnal here now. Sad for us to bid farewell to hot days, but great for good traditional bread pudding!

Take your stale bread

and tear it into ‘feeding small birds’ pieces. Not swans. Little birds.

Pour over enough cold water to saturate it. I used about 1½ pints, but start with 1 pint. There’s nothing to stop you drowning it completely, but it just increases the amount of time you spend squeezing the water out afterwards.
Let it sit for an hour to get thoroughly soggy.

Putting a couple of handful of soggy bread in the sieve at a time, squeeze and press the water out. You can use whatever utensil you like, but I had great success using my hands.

Once it’s all been squeezed, return to a large bowl and beat with a wooden spoon until it’s mushy and smoother.

Add the raisins, sugar, cinnamon and mixed spice and beat them in.
Add the beaten eggs and melted butter and beat that in too.

Add a little milk (I used about 2 tbsp) to achieve a nice dropping consistency

Pour into a greased baking tin (mine was 9×13″) and sprinkle some demerara sugar and a good rasping of nutmeg over the top. Bake for 1½ to 2 hours.

Until browned, firm and pulling away from the edges of the tin.

Cool in the tin, sprinkle with more sugar and cut into slabs, squares or dainty fingers.

Enjoy!

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Bread Pudding

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1 lb stale bread
9oz raisins
4oz sugar
4oz butter, melted or very soft
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp mixed spice
2 eggs, beaten
Milk to mix
Nutmeg and Demerara sugar to dredge

Tear the bread into small ‘feed the birds’ pieces.
Pour over cold water to saturate the bread – anything between 1 and 2 pints depending on the staleness of your bread. Leave to soak for an hour.

Heat oven to GM3/160/325
Grease a baking tin of around 9×13″.

Put a couple of handfuls of soggy bread at a time into a nylon sieve and strain and squeeze as much water as you can out of the bread. Beat with a wooden spoon to reduce to mush.
Add the fruit, butter, spices and eggs and beat together. Add enough milk to get a soft dropping consistency, but don’t let it get too wet. I only needed about 2 tbsps.
Pour into the tin and scatter with Demerara sugar and a good rasping of nutmeg.

Bake for 1 1/2 to 2 hours until firm and pulled away from the side of the tin.
Cool in the tin, then when cold, cut into slabs or daintier fingers. Dredge with more sugar if you like.

Store in an airtight container – you can also freeze it.

When is fudge called butter tablet? No idea, but this Ballymaloe fudge has become a firm favourite. Slightly more crystalline than the smooth fudge you get commercially, it has a deep brown sugar flavour, a snow-like juddering melt, rich with butter and heady with vanilla. It keeps well in an airtight container in the fridge and is perfect to give as a gift. It even converted a fudge refuser into a fan. That can’t be bad.

My Mum would commit murder to get her hands on this fudge. Worth knowing in case you need someone dispatched.

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Melt 225g unsalted butter in a large saucepan over a low heat and add a tin of evaporated milk, 200ml water mixed with 2-4 tsp vanilla extract. Stir with a whisk. Sit with a heatproof whisk. You are going to be stirring from this second until the fudge is in the tin, so find your happy place.

Add 900g brown sugar. I have experimented with all sorts of brown sugar and all have worked well. In this batch, I used up some opened packets, so there’s a mixture of light muscovado, soft brown sugar and demerara. If your sugar even implies lumpiness, do yourself a favour and sieve it first. Tiresome, I know, but better than beating the lumps out. Keep stirring.

Stir with the heatproof whisk until the sugar has melted. Keep stirring.

Increase the heat to bring to a simmer once the sugar has melted and stir, stir, stir until you reach the soft ball stage, 240F / 116C on a sugar themometer. Be careful. I know, I know, but really, be careful. When it splashes it hurts. Keep stirring.

Ah! We’re there!

I used my funky new digital themometer after the sad demise of my old one and I’m afraid I have to say that the temp didn’t get to softball, but when I dropped a blob into a saucer of cold water, it was firm, yet malleable, so I don’t know what to tell you. Hmm. Whilst it is science, it’s also art. I’ve checked the themometer and it is correct, so think of the temperature as a guide more than a law.

Use your cooking intuition. When the texture changes and the temperature is approaching the softball range, test it in the water. If it falls apart and/or disintegrates, then it isn’t ready. It does take a long time for the temperature to get up there, so to speak, so be patient and zen out at one with your fudge making. And your stirring.

Remove from the heat, place on a pot holder or folded cloth and carry on stirring, observing the gradual change from liquid to fudge. Call Ian in and get him to stir it for 5 minutes if your arm gets tired. He won’t mind.

Once it looks a little paler…

… and starts to hold its shape, you’re there.

Pour it into a buttered tin – 9 x 13″ and quickly spread it out.

I like to press my little spatula on to the surface and lift it up so that you get a rough surface. I think it tastes better that way.

Cool it in the tin, then turn it out and cut into even, or uneven squares. or you could cut it into bars and wrap it up that way. Either way, cut it, stick it in an airtight container in the fridge, eat lots, give away lots and then remember to take a photo of it when you have 2 pieces left.

Yeah. It’s that good.

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Ballymaloe Fudge

PRINT THIS RECIPE (opens in a new window)

225g unsalted butter
1 x 410g  can evaporated milk
200ml water
900g light brown sugar (or a combination of brown sugars – soft brown, light muscovado, even a sprinkle of demerara)
2 – 4 teaspoons vanilla extract

Shallow or swiss roll tin 9 x 13″

Melt the butter in a large saucepan over a low heat.

Add the evaporated milk, water, sugar(s) and vanilla extract. Stir with a whisk until the sugar has dissolved.

Increase the heat until the mixture simmers. Stir constantly until it reaches the soft ball stage. In the absence of a sugar themometer, test this by putting a blob of fudge into a saucer of cold water. It should be firm but malleable.

Remove from the heat and * stir until it thickens, pales slightly and reaches the slightly gritty consistency of fudge. Once you are seeing the change from liquid to solid starting to happen (and don’t fret; you’ll see it happening, although it might take several… many minutes),  pour into the tin.

Spread the mixture evenly into the tin and, if you like, spike the top up a bit by touching the top with a spatula and lifting up. Equally, you could do some elegant wave effect, but whatever you do, get on with it because with each second that it cools in the tin, the less co-operative it will be.

Let it cool in the tin. Turn the whole slab out and then cut it into even, or uneven, squares, bars, or whatever you like.

* the original recipe instructs you to remove the pan from the heat and sit the pan in cold water. When I did that, the fudge cooled before I could get the texture right. I have far more success leaving it at room temperature and stirring to get the consistency correct.
Store in an airtight tub in the fridge. Keeps for longer than we have ever managed to. Great, great, great gift!