Cesar Christmas Bread Pudding
This recipe follows the published Cesar formula: two-day-old bread, milk, sugar, butter, honey, cinnamon, yolks and white wine. Unlike many northern mexidos recipes, it contains no nuts or raisins. It is very rich, so serve small portions.
- Yields
- 8–10 small servings
- Prep
- 25 min
- Cook
- 35–45 min
Ingredients
- 500 g / 17.6 oz Two-day-old white bread crumb
- 1.25 litres / 5¼ cups Whole milk
- 300 g / 1½ cups Sugar
- 250 g / 8.8 oz Unsalted butter
- 150 ml / ⅔ cup Honey
- 6–7 Egg yolks
- 250 ml / 1 cup Dry white wine
- 1 tbsp, plus extra to finish Ground cinnamon
- 1 Cinnamon stick
Method
Remove the hardest crusts and cover the bread crumb with cold water. Soak for 10 minutes, drain, then squeeze it very thoroughly by hand or in a clean cloth.
Put the bread in a wide, heavy-based pan. Add the milk, sugar, butter, nearly all the honey, the ground cinnamon and the cinnamon stick broken in two.
Cook over low heat, stirring continuously and scraping the base, until the bread breaks down into a thick, cohesive pudding. Allow about 30 minutes, adjusting the heat to prevent scorching.
In a bowl, beat the yolks with the white wine and reserved honey. Briefly remove the pan from the heat and add the mixture in a thin stream, stirring slowly enough to leave small traces of yolk visible.
Return to low heat and cook, stirring constantly, only until it begins to bubble and the yolk mixture reaches at least 71°C / 160°F. Do not let it boil hard.
Remove the cinnamon stick, spoon into bowls or a serving dish and leave to cool. Finish with a light dusting of cinnamon and serve warm or cold.