sweet toothed.

hi. can we just take a minute to notice ed referred to me as esteemed? i am glad this is down in writing as our friendship seems to rely on a heavy portion of him taking the piss out of me, so we'll all just remind him he referred to me as esteemed when that happens, yeah? cheers guys.
so, this week had it's fair share of drama when one of my fake teeth decided to up and fall out, leaving me looking like an extra from shameless and woefully without capacity to bite after i baked three brilliant loaves of white bread from the river cottage bread handbook. it all got fixed on friday so i'm back to smiling without chronic insecurity and can bite things again. by this time, the bread that was left had, sadly, staled, and i was left perusing the 'things to do with leftover bread' chapter in said cookbook. i eventually settled on bread and butter pudding due to the fact that at my brother's 21st he had a mediocre one, so i figured i'd do a bit of culinary memory erasing for him by blowing it out of the water.

i really like this kind of cooking. i once, somewhat inappropriately referred to it as 'old testament cooking. you know that chapter where it's all 'barry begot jim who begot dave who begot blahblahblah'? think 'bread begot bread and butter pudding, leftover cream begot truffles' kinda thing and you're on the right lines. for someone who purportedly doesn't respond to structure, i sure do like allowing food to dictate the rhythm of what i cook and when. it feels like the home cooking that was largely absent from my childhood (although i am not pulling at that decidedly freudian thread right now).

so, bread and butter pudding, let's go:

serves 6

you need:

about 600g one or two-day old white bread

about 50g unsalted butter, softened

300ml double cream

300ml whole milk

1 vanilla pod

6 medium free range egg yolks

200g caster sugar

a good handful of raisins

butter a shallow oval baking dish, about 30 x 20cm. cut the bread into medium-thick slices, butter them, and halve the slices on the diagonal to form triangles.

pour the cream and milk into a saucepan. split the vanilla pod lengthways, scrape out the seeds with a teaspoon and add them to the pan with the empty pod. bring just to the boil over a medium heat, then take off the heat and leave for 10 minutes to infuse. in a large bowl, briefly whisk together the egg yolks and 150g of the sugar to combine. pour in the milk and cream mixture, whisking all the time. this is your custard.

arrange the triangles of bread in the baking dish - in rows, propped up and leaning on each other so they just come proud of the dish, sprinkling the raisins in between. continue in this way until you've filled the dish, cutting the pieces up and tucking them in to fill any gaps as you need to. don't try and be neat, the point of this is that the propped up ends stand clear of the custard and turn golden and crispy in the oven. try not to leave too many raisins exposed, as they are liable to scorch during baking.

now pour over the custard, making sure you moisten all the pieces of bread. let the pudding stand for 20 minutes or so to allow the custard to soak in. heat the oven to 180 degress c/gas mark 4, and boil the kettle.

when you are ready to bake, sprinkle over the rest of the sugar. sit the dish in a roasting tin and pour in enough boiling water to come halfway up the side of the dish (this bain-marie will help keep the pudding soft). bake for 20-30 minutes, until the custard is set in the middle - prod the top with your finger to check. serve hot or warm, with ice cream or cream.

here it is, served with unholy amounts of cream (my penchant for dairy will be a massive stumbling block should i take the plunge into veganism). the only alteration i made to the recipe was a little trick i picked up from nigella lawson's recipe for banana bread, in how to be a domestic goddess, which is to steep the raisins. literally just cover them in booze in a saucepan, bring briefly to the boil, then let sit for as long as is possible to swell and absorb before using. i used, and ed is probably going to be horrified at this, jack daniels in this instance, but i have used rum, kahlua, even in a pinch, earl grey tea in the past with success. as nigella says, the booze doesn't pervade, you just end up with 'aromatic, gently swollen fruit' (god how loaded is her language, right?). anyways, this recipe was an absolute triumph, and given i plan to be making bread again very soon now that my capacity to eat it has been restored, i will definitely be repeating this excessively vanilla laden delight. stay tuned to see if i still fit in my sequinned hotpants by the end of the month.