Cranberry & Orange Bread and Butter Pudding

Welcome to Day 21 of Blogmas At Home 2024! 🎄🎅🏻✨

Bread and butter pudding is a quintessentially English dessert that… can sound a bit wacky if you’re not used to it. It’s essentially layers of (stale) bread that are spread with butter, sprinkled with sugar and dried fruit, then soaked in a simple custard mixture before being baked until golden and puffed. To the uninitiated, that might not sound great, but I love it! If it helps, you can just think of it as a big, baked version of French Toast— it’s a very similar concept!

Anyway, I wanted to make a festive variation on a traditional bread and butter pudding, so I created this: my Cranberry & Orange Bread and Butter Pudding. The cranberries are soaked in a zesty, orange syrup before being added to the dish, while the custard is lightly spiced with allspice and nutmeg for a super Christmassy, warming flavour. This recipe makes a great dessert, but I also really enjoy having it for breakfast too— it would make a perfect Christmas Eve/Day breakfast/brunch!

Ingredients

To make this festive bread and butter pudding, you’ll need the following ingredients:

• Bread

You can use lots of different types of bread for this: a plain, white sliced bread works well, or you can use an enriched loaf, such a challah or brioche, for an extra special pudding! The bread needs to be stale, so, if you can, slice the bread in advance and leave the slices out overnight before making the pudding. In a pinch, though, I find a very gentle toasting can also work!

Some people like to remove the crusts off the bread for this recipe, but I quite like the texture they give. Do whatever works for you!

• Unsalted butter

I prefer using unsalted butter when baking, so that I can control the amount of salt. The butter needs to be softened/at room temperature, so it is spreadable. You can use salted, if that’s what you have, but I would recommend omitting the extra salt if you do this.

• Caster sugar

I prefer using caster sugar, instead of granulated sugar, because it dissolves more easily into the pudding, giving the inner, custard-y section a lovely, smooth texture, while still achieving a crispy outer crust.

• Milk

I like to use a 50:50 ratio of milk to cream for my bread and butter pudding, for the perfect combination of rich and creamy, but also light and fluffy. Whole milk is best, but you can use skimmed/semi-skimmed too, if that’s what you have.

• Cream

Use double cream for the best results.

• Eggs

I always use large eggs.

• Dried cranberries

This is where we start getting festive! I prefer to use unsweetened cranberries, but you can use whatever you would like.

• Orange

You’ll need both the zest and the juice for this recipe.

• Ground allspice

The first of the festive spices in this pudding, allspice lends a gentle warmth to the custard.

• Nutmeg

I prefer to buy nutmeg whole and grate it fresh whenever I need it, rather than buy the ready-ground stuff.

• Salt

Just a little pinch of fine sea salt, to help bring out all of the flavours. If you’re using salted butter, leave this out.

• Vanilla extract

Because this is a custard-based dish, it’s good to add a little vanilla extract to counter any potential egginess.

Method

Bread and butter pudding is so simple to make— it’s essentially just an assembly job! Grease the baking dish with butter (truly, don’t skip this step— It makes the clean up so much easier!), so it’s all ready for you, then get making. You can use any oven-safe dish for this— I’ve used a standard pie dish here, but I often make this recipe in a rectangular baking dish (18 x 27 x 5cm), which works really well too, so use whatever you have that’s roughly that kind of size!

For this recipe, you need to start by soaking the cranberries. Place them into a small saucepan, along with the orange zest and juice, plus a heaped teaspoon of sugar.

Place the saucepan over medium heat and stir frequently while the sugar melts and the liquid comes to a boil. Allow the mixture to bubble for about 30 seconds, then remove the pan from the heat and set aside to cool.

While the cranberries are cooling, you can start preparing the pudding. Spread the stale bread slices thickly on one side with the butter, making sure to use every last bit!

Next, cut the bread slices into whatever shape you would like: triangles (like I’ve done here) are popular, but cubes can also work well!

Place half of the bread slices, butter-side up, into your greased baking dish, trying your best to cover the bottom in an even layer (do a better job than me, if you can). Don’t worry about arranging the bread too nicely at this stage, as there’s another layer of bread to come!

Sprinkle half of the caster sugar evenly over the bread layer, then scatter over all of the cooled, soaked cranberries (along with any orange-y juices). The reason you add all of the dried fruit at this stage is so that it is sandwiched between the two bread layers, so it won’t burn in the oven.

Now you can top up the dish with the remaining bread pieces, again, placing them butter-side up. This will form the top of your pudding, so, if you want it to look extra fancy, arrange your bread pieces in a nice pattern (I went for this starry situation, because it is Christmas, after all).

Evenly sprinkle over the remaining sugar, then set the dish aside while you prepare the custard.

Place the eggs into a bowl.

Whisk the eggs well.

Add the milk and cream, then whisk again until completely incorporated.

Strain the mixture through a sieve into a jug. This removes any stringy bits of egg to ensure that the baked custard will be silky smooth. Don’t skip this step!

Once the custard has been strained, add the ground allspice, freshly grated nutmeg, salt and vanilla extract. Mix well to combine.

Pour the custard mixture evenly over the bread in the baking dish, then set aside at room temperature for 30 minutes, so that the bread can absorb some of the custard.

You want to make sure the bread slices are submerged in the custard during the resting period, so gently press down on them from time to time, if needed, until the time is up and they have absorbed lots of the delicious custard.

Once the pudding has stood for 30 minutes, you can bake it for 45-55 minutes at 170°C (conventional oven, not fan), until golden and puffed. Allow the pudding to stand for 5 minutes before serving (the pudding will deflate slightly as it cools).

Variations

• Milk or Cream

I like to use a 50:50 ratio of milk to cream in my bread and butter puddings, but you can use any ratio you want! Using 100% cream makes for a really luxurious, rich and heavy dessert, while using 100% milk makes for a lighter, less dense bake. A 50:50 ratio gives you the best of both worlds, but any ratio will work. Often, if I have a small amount of cream to use up, I’ll just put it in a jug, then make it up to 570ml with milk.

• Fruit

I’ve used cranberries here, to make this super seasonal, but you could use any kind of dried fruit you like. If you plan to use larger dried fruits (such as apricots or figs), I’d recommend chopping them finely before adding them to the dish. If you’re an anti-dried fruit kind of person, you can leave them out, or substitute them with chopped nuts or chocolate chips!

• Spices

I’ve included allspice and nutmeg in this bread and butter pudding recipe, to make it extra Christmassy and warming, but you can omit the spices if you’d prefer a fresher, fruitier taste.

Make-Ahead

Bread and butter pudding can be made ahead in a variety of different ways to suit your festive needs:

• Once baked, the pudding can be stored in the fridge for 2-3 days. Simply warm through individual servings in the microwave, or the whole lot in the oven, when you’re ready to serve it (apparently, it is also very delicious cold, but I can’t say I’ve ever tried that!).
• If you want to bake the pudding at the last minute, you can store the unbaked pudding (covered) in the fridge for up to 24 hours. You can bake it cold from the fridge, but it will need a little longer in the oven.

Making the pudding ahead means you can have delicious, festive bread & butter pudding at any time during the holiday season— even on Christmas morning!

Recipe