Mayhem is Almost Over! Bread Pudding Part II

Yes, I know Taneasha posted Bread Pudding on Friday, but this isn’t the same thing at all. Bread pudding is one of those infinitely flexible dishes, like my biscuits or Taneasha’s baked potato. You can do just about anything with them.

Case in point: She cleaned out her fancy baking ingredient cupboard, and I dug wild things out of the dirt.

Recipe Guy and I got a ton of wild onions when we went digging in the yard, and that was just from one bunch. There were bunches all over the place. Until Mowing Man drove the John Deere into the front pasture, that is. Dammit. There goes the free food. Technically, it’s still there, but it’s no longer likely to reproduce and it’s a lot harder to spot. I mean, something that looks like this:

Kinda hard to miss.

When it’s hacked down to ground level? Not so much. Oh well, there were still berries in the back of the house and at the base of the power pole out front. Not to mention the herb garden. Herb gardens are lovely, fragrant, perennial and self-seeding. Very handy and very low maintenance if you’re looking for something to pretty up the front yard.  

And of course, you always have fresh herbs on hand. Like the dill we used in this recipe.  (No, there’s no dill in the pic above, the dill is on the other side and I don’t seem to have a pic of that side. You’ll just have to trust me that it’s there.)

Savoury Bread Pudding

What You Need:

• 1 large bunch of spinach
• 2-3 slices of cooked bacon
• 1 shallot or a few wild onions
• 1 tbsp bacon fat, butter, or olive oil
• 2 tbsp chopped fresh dill
• 4 eggs (or equivalent)
• 1 c cream
• 3 c bread, chopped or torn into chunks
• 1 c grated cheese

What You Gotta Do:

You’ll want your spinach clean and ready to go before you heat the pan. The best way to get rid of any remaining dirt on the spinach is to put it in a sink full of cold water. The leaves will float, the dirt will sink. Plus, if your spinach is starting to look a little old and limp, a few ice cubes and a teaspoon of vinegar added to the water will perk it up nicely.

Once you’ve rinsed and dried your spinach leaves, stack a few of them on top of each other

and roll them up.

This works best if you put the biggest ones on the bottom. Now that you’ve got a nice little spinach burrito, slice it. Lovely shredded leaves. This technique works for any leafy green, from tender basil to mature romaine.

Dice the onions (or shallot, if you don’t happen to have wild onions in your yard) and the bacon, and drop them into a pan over medium heat. We started the pan with a tbps or so of bacon fat in it, but you could easily replace that with butter or olive oil.

It’ll take a few minutes for the onions to soften and the bacon to start sizzling again. Add the spinach and dill to the pan.

Cook until it's nice and wilted.

Assembling the pudding can be done any way you’d like.

Mix the bread, veggies and cheese all together; keep them separate, in layers;  any way you’d like… We mixed the bread and veg.

Any kind of bread will work for a pudding. A dense whole grain rye, a crusty baguette, or as we used, the soft centre bits pulled out of a giant loaf that we turned into a mufalletta sammich. Each will give the pudding a slightly different flavour and texture, and each is perfect for a savoury bread pudding.

Whisk together the eggs and cream.

The ingredient list says 4 eggs, but I had some egg whites in a container, so I used 3 eggs and the whites. Any combination will work, as long as you have the volume of about 4 eggs.

The custard for this pudding is pretty much exactly like the custard you’d use for a sweet bread pudding, only difference is in the seasoning. Taneasha used sweet vanilla, I added some nice hot cayenne.

Sugar and Spice, that’s what this is all about. ;)

Put half of the bread and veg mixture in the very well buttered small casserole dish and start sprinkling on the cheese.

Until it looks kinda like this:

Then the other half of the bread and veg mixture.

Now pour on the spicey custard (really, I’m so used to heat in my food that the tiny dash of cayenne wasn’t even discernable to me, but others noticed it, so I’m calling it spicey). The custard will soak into the bread, but you should have enough custard that it completely saturates the bread and squishes out if you poke it.

And then top with the rest of the cheese.

After it bakes in a 350 degree oven for about 50-60 minutes, a piece of spaghetti stuck in the middle will come out nearly clean (spaghetti’s longer than a toothpick and lets you actually test the centre) and the pudding will be golden brown and nicely puffed up.

The puff will soften as it cools, but it shouldn’t fall too much. If you’re planning on serving this to guests, I recommend doing it warm, fresh out of the oven while it’s still impressive and fluffy. It goes perfectly for dinner with a green salad, or as the centrepiece of a casual brunch.

For us, it was a handy little lunch that used up the almost wilted spinach.

It’s also the perfect thing to eat by the forkful right out of the fridge as you’re trying to decide what to have for a snack.

What do you eat straight from the container as you stand with the fridge door open?

Voodoo Jambalaya - Ready for more Mayhem?

How convenient is it that we happen to have a Friday the 13th in our month of Mayhem?  Sounds like a great opportunity to talk about superstitions to me, and why not put together a great recipe along the way.  What better way to do that than Voodoo Jambalaya? 

1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon garlic powder
½ teaspoon black pepper
½ teaspoon onion powder
½ teaspoon oregano
½ teaspoon thyme
½ teaspoon cayenne (optional)
1 – 1.25 lbs. chicken, diced
1 green bell pepper
1 medium onion
3 stalks of celery
3 cloves of garlic
1 14oz. can diced tomatoes
1 15oz. can kidney beans
1 4oz. can chopped green chilies
1 cup uncooked rice

The first thing you want to do is measure your spices and stir them together.  Be careful here.  Trouble is indicted by the accidental omission of spices from a recipe (oh dear) or by the spilling of salt. Set those aside, and start on the veggies.  Dice up the bell pepper, onion, and celery, also known as ‘the trinity’. 

You can mince your garlic now, as well, but keep it separate from the other stuff.  I was lazy and bought already diced chicken breast, but if you need to dice yours, just cut it into bite sized cubes. 

Heat your pan over medium heat and add a tablespoon or so of vegetable or olive oil.  Throw in your chicken and brown it on all sides. 

Since we’re on the subject of chicken, did you know one must not eat chicken or turkey on the first day of the year lest, like the birds in question, diners fate themselves to scratch in the dirt all year for their dinner?  There are many superstitions about eating chicken on the first day of the year, and most of them basically say that you will be poverty stricken or at least take steps back instead of forward.  Who knew eating chicken could be so detrimental? 

Ok, back to cooking.  Once the chicken is browned, it doesn’t need to be cooked all the way through, remove it from the pan.  This is why we sear the chicken first.  These brown bits bring a lot of flavor to the party. 

Add the trinity to the hot pan and sprinkle with a pinch of salt. 

Cook the mixture for about 5 minutes and then add your garlic.  Continue to stir and cook for another 2 or 3 minutes, or until everything is softened.  Sprinkle on your spice mixture. 

Stir it around for about 45 seconds before adding the tomatoes.  Stir them in, scraping the bits from the bottom of the pan.  Drain and rinse the kidney beans then add them to the pan with the green chilies and the chicken. 

Speaking of beans, did you know eating beans on the first day of the year will bring luck and prosperity?  Ok, so chicken bad… beans good.  Got that? 

I wonder if that applies to chicken stock?  Oh well, it’s May.  Go ahead and pour in the chicken stock and stir. 

Bring the whole thing to a boil and stir in the rice, then cover and reduce the heat to low for 25 minutes, or until the rice is nice and tender.  Stir it occasionally during that time so it doesn’t burn on the bottom, but don’t keep the lid off too long. 

I served it with a slice of 3 cheese semolina bread that I picked up from the professionals.  Although, it was once (and perhaps still is) a superstition that if you found a hole in a loaf of bread you cut, it symbolized a coffin and meant that someone was soon to die.

Perhaps I should have skipped the bread?

Well, as dangerous as my Voodoo Jambalaya might sound, it was absolutely fabulous.  I definitely think it’s worth the risk.  

 

Do you have any food traditions based on superstitions?