Recipe courtesy of Dan Pennington
as seen on episode “Pumpkins”, season 5
Ingredients:
- 2 cups half & half
- 1 can of pureed pumpkin*
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 ½ tsp pumpkin spice
- 1 ½ tsp vanilla extract
- 10 cups of day old bread, cubed
- ½ cup raisins, golden or brown
Whisk together first seven ingredients in a large bowl. Fold in the bread cubes and raisins until well coated. Pour the mixture into a baking dish and let stand for at least 15 minutes. Smooth the top of the bread pudding, then bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes or until a tester inserted in the middle comes out clean. Serve with Caramel Sauce.
Caramel Sauce
Ingredients:
- 1 ¼ cups packed dark brown sugar
- ½ cup unsalted butter
- ½ cup whipping cream
Slowly melt together the butter and brown sugar over low heat until it turns a light golden brown. Be sure and stir the mixture constantly so it doesn’t scorch. Once the mixture is light golden brown, stir in the whipping cream. Continue to stir constantly cooking over low heat until the sauce turns a honey color.
*NOTE:
A medium sized (4 pound) sugar pumpkin should yield around 1 ½ cups of mashed pumpkin. This puree can be used in all your recipes calling for canned pumpkin. To bake, simply cut the pumpkin in half and discard the stem, seeds and stringy pulp. In a shallow baking dish, place the two halves face down and cover with foil. Bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for about 1 ½ hours or until tender. Once the baked pumpkin has cooled, scoop out the flesh and puree or mash it.
