Berry Bread Pudding: what to do with leftover cranberry sauce

I hope you had a great Thanksgiving. My family enjoyed good food, all the traditional favorites, football of course, played a board game, and skyped with family. Afterwards the amount of leftovers was staggering. Thankfully, on Thanksgiving, the 'leftover' stigma takes a holiday, possibly because everyone's too busy rejoicing over the five-day turkey sandwich extravaganza that's about to ensue

Speaking of leftovers, I had so much cranberry sauce that this beautiful new bread pudding recipe was born. It's was a delicious solution. It's special enough for guests and special occasions, Holiday breakfasts or brunch or a weekend with the family. 

This new recipe was actually my first bread pudding experience. It was a hit! The combination of cranberry tartness, sweet cinnamon sugar, rich egg-y bread, and crisp apple and pear was incredibly impressive. No one will even consider the word leftover, while savoring this red festive dessert.

 the original recipe, it was adapted from 2007 issue of Rachael Ray's magazine Everyday. 

Ingredients:
1 loaf of cinnamon raisin loaf bread, sliced (approx 1 lb)
5 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup half and half
1/2 cup buttermilk
3 Tbs melted unsalted butter (melting them separately is easiest)
1 Tbs unsalted cold butter, cubed
1 cup leftover or fresh cranberry sauce
4 Tbs  + 1/2 cup sugar, divided
1/4  tsp + 1/2 Tbs cinnamon, divided
2 Tbs lemon juice
1 large apple, washed/peeled/diced
1 pear, washed/peeled/diced 
powered sugar (optional)
1/2 cup nuts, chopped (your favorite.... I used almonds)

Prep:

1. Combine the pear, apple, 3 Tbs sugar, the lemon juice, 1/4 tsp cinnamon, and 1 Tbs melted butter to a medium sized bowl. Set aside.

2. In a large bowl whisk together the eggs, half & half, milk, buttermilk, and 1/2 cup sugar. Set aside. 

3. Prep a large 11"x17" baking dish by spreading 1 Tbs melted butter to prevent sticking. You can use nonstick spray here to make it a bit more figure friendly.

4. Melt the 3rd Tbs of butter. Spread butter and cranberry sauce on each slice of bread. Stack the bread into 2 stacks so they don't fall over on ya.

5. Cut the 2 stacks of bread diagonally into triangles. 

6. Spread out and stagger the first stack of the bread in the buttered baking dish. It will overlap that's fine just don't stack it in. 

7. Next top the bread with the apple pear mixture.  

8. Cover the fruit with the remaining triangles of 2nd stack of buttered cranberry bread.

9. Pour in the dairy/egg  mixture. Wrap the baking dish with plastic wrap and still in the fridge for at least an hr to let the flavors blend for up to 2 days

    Baking:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. While the oven preheats let the pudding come to room temperature outside of the fridge.

2. Chop your nuts if not chopped. To create the topping for the pudding: in a bowl combine the nuts, with 1 Tbs sugar and 1/2 Tbs cinnamon. Sprinkle this over the bread pudding.

3. Top with the 1 Tbs cold cubed unsalted butter

4. Bake for 1 hour - will be golden and delicious and your entire house will smell like cinnamon :)

5. Let it rest for approx 10 minutes. The longer you let it rest the firmer it will be.

Fruit filled cranberry sauce

Here is an easy cranberry sauce recipe to use during the holidays for Thanksgiving and/or Christmas if you do a turkey to celebrate. Some years I have done a turkey for both thanksgiving and Christmas. Its easy, fun, and well that means I don't have to put all the pressure on "THE" Thanksgiving dinner. If I want to try a new turkey method or turkey recipe, I can, and my hubby knows that there is more turkey just around the corner. 

One year I did a duck for Christmas and wow it didn't turn out well. It was a huge crash and burn. It took HOURS to get the smoke out of my kitchen, and about a week for it the smell of the duck fat leave the house. So after that embarrassing confession... lets just go back to the cranberries. Juicy, red, round, tart fruit. I promise even if you don't follow the recipe you won't end up with a huge mess of fat and grease everywhere like I did with my holiday duck experiment. I make the sauce the day before Thanksgiving or Christmas to save room on the stove for something else, the day of. After the big Turkey meal this semi tart, semi sweet, beautifully red sauce will keep in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks. Bring on the leftover turkey sandwiches (wink, wink).  

Recipe was adapted from a Rachael Ray cooking magazine November 2007. The original recipe is here, but I think my variation with the apple & orange juice is better.  Either way cranberry sauce is super easy to make and very portable if you have to travel for the holidays. 

Ingredients:

 1 cup white sugar

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp ground ginger (finely chopped fresh ginger would be lovely in this 1-2 tsp)

2 tsp grated orange peel

1/4 tsp salt

1/8 tsp ground cloves

One 12 oz bag of fresh cranberries

1 finely chopped and peeled apple

Juice of half an orange 

Directions:

1. Combine everything in a sauce pan except cranberries with 1 cup water (med heat)

2. Stir until sugar is dissolved

3. Add cranberries and bring to a boil

4. Reduce heat and simmer about 8 minutes

That's it. Super easy. You got this. Stay away from the canned stuff. It might be cheaper but has little taste compared to homemade. 

Keep enjoying the holidays!

From my kitchen to yours