It tastes excellent to prepare this pasta dish with chicken and Italian dressing. You can serve it warm or cold.
| Prep Time: | 20 mins |
| Cook Time: | 1 hr 25 mins |
| Additional Time: | 1 hr 15 mins |
| Total Time: | 3 hrs |
| Servings: | 8 |
| Yield: | 1 9×9-inch pan |
Ingredients
- 8 eggs
- 2 cups milk
- 2 cups heavy whipping cream
- 1 ½ cups white sugar
- ¼ cup rum
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 loaf Italian bread, cut into 1-inch cubes
- 1 cup white sugar
- ½ cup water
- ½ teaspoon vinegar
- ¼ cup water
- ¼ cup butter
Instructions
- Beat eggs in a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed until foamy, 2 to 3 minutes. Beat in milk, cream, 1 1/2 cup sugar, rum, vanilla extract, and salt until mixture is thoroughly combined. Gently stir bread cubes into the egg mixture to coat. Let bread soak until the egg mixture has been absorbed, about 1 hour; stir occasionally.
- Dissolve 1 cup sugar with 1/2 cup water and vinegar in a heavy saucepan. Place over high heat and cook without stirring until the sugar mixture is dark amber in color, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool until it stops bubbling. Gradually stir 1/4 cup water into the syrup, about 1 tablespoon at a time, stirring until water is incorporated.
- Pour warm sauce into a 9×9-inch baking pan and swirl the pan so the caramel sauce coats the bottom and sides of the pan. Let caramel sauce set, about 15 minutes. Coat inside of baking dish and caramel layer with butter. Transfer soaked bread cubes and any remaining liquid into the baking dish over caramel sauce and gently press bread cubes together. Cover pan with parchment paper.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
- Place baking pan into a large roasting pan and pour enough boiling water into the roasting pan to reach halfway up the sides of the baking pan.
- Bake in the preheated oven until a knife inserted into the middle of the pudding comes out clean, about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Let stand for 5 to 10 minutes. Run a knife around the outside of the pan and invert pudding and caramel sauce onto a serving platter.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 847 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 110 g |
| Cholesterol | 288 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 2 g |
| Protein | 17 g |
| Saturated Fat | 20 g |
| Sodium | 723 mg |
| Sugars | 67 g |
| Fat | 37 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Everyone loves this every time I make it. I do 2 batches of caramel sauce and put one in the bottom of the pan and drizzle the second batch over the top.
Wonderful …
I had never made bread pudding until I made this one and it was amazing. It was actually the best bread pudding I have ever tasted!!! I will be making many more times in the future!!!!
I adapted the recipe a lot to make a dairy free desert. I used 5 heaping cups of fresh whole grain crumbled bread, & being uncertain how many cups of bread there would be in the Italian loaf, I added 2 more eggs, 1 teaspoon more vanilla, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, 1/4 C more rum, 1/2 C more raw sugar, 4 C Silk vanilla soy milk instead of milk or cream, and currants. This large quantity took forever to bake, but the family loves the pudding, and they are a fussy bunch.
Very good recipe, I added a teaspoon of cinnamon and replaced the spiced rum with fireball, (do to on hand availability 🙂 ) I cheated and bought some caramelized pecans to go with some caramel sause, like smuckers, found with the hot fudge in grocery stores, Added the perfect topping with vanilla ice. cream.
First time I’ve ever made a bread pudding and it was FABULOUS. I could not find an Italian loaf to save my life so I used a French loaf. And I added a tsp of vanilla extract to the caramel sauce while cooking it. So good!
I changed VERY little (added soaked Craisins and cinnamon, vanilla to the caramel sauce) and this recipe is absolutely delicious! I wouldn’t change anything else…can’t rave enough…pick this recipe above the others – trust me!
I was scared to use so many eggs! but this is my favorite bread pudding now – seriously the best I’ve ever made!! I followed the recipe completely – except for adding a teaspoon of cinnamon. It slid out of the baking dish like a flan – and even looked like a flan to our amazement. Next time, I’ll add butter and vanilla extract to the caramel to give it a bit more creaminess. Outside of that, I wouldn’t change a thing. Oh, except for adding more sugar to combat the egg flavor.
Made this for my Husband for Father’s Day…..my whole family loved it and the couple of fork fulls I allowed myself were so worth it 🙂 I added two teaspoons of cinnamon to the egg mixture. I also did not make the Caramel Sauce, as I found Smucker’s Special Recipe Butterscotch Caramel Flavored Topping and i used that. My husband loves Butterscotch and I thinned it out a little with about 2 tablespoons of rum to a half cut of topping. then I just poured it over the whole thing. Served it with Ice Cream too…..yes that’s how bad we got this past weekend.
I made this twice this week, the first time I burnt the caramel and made it with out it. The pudding was so good I made it again and didn’t burn the caramel. I used 3 day old dry Italian loaf on the first one and it soaked up the egg mixture very well and was a very moist and flavorful result. The 2nd one was not as old and crustier and didn’t soak up the egg as well giving a drier result. Both times I had more then half the egg mixture left over so the next time I make this and I will make it again I am going to cut the measurements on the egg mixture. So very good!
This actually works. Good way to avoid buying caramel topping. My only changes are – didn’t use Italian bread (I put my bread heels in the freezer so I can cook things like bread pudding once a month), I cut the sugar in the pudding to only 2/3 a cup and added two diced apples, and I presoaked the apples in the rum.