Bread Pudding. Leftover bread.

Before We Were Free by Julia Alvarez

“We make a quick stop at Wimpy’s to pick up one apple to put in the mouth of the roasted pig and a few dates for the delicious bread pudding, pudín de pan, we always eat on Christmas Day.” Before We Were Free, Julia Alvarez.

Over the last several years or so, I have become a fan of bread pudding. It’s a relatively easy thing to make, and a great way to use up random, dry, leftover pieces of bread— though you could very easily use fresh bread as well.

Mine tends to be less bread pudding like and more like baked french toast. But for this one I adapted a Bread Pudding recipe I learned from a Puerto Rican cooking class that I took.

Though bread pudding has been around since around the 11th Century in Europe, the Latin American bread pudding, tends to be more custard like and served on special occasions such as Christmas, as the characters in Julia Alvarez’s Before We Are Free, which takes place in the Dominican Republic, are going to do.

---

---

Budin de Pan (Bread Pudding)

1 loaf of bread, 1 can of condensed milk, 2 cans evaporated milk, 2 cans coconut milk, 2 tbs butter, 1 tsp vanilla, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 cup raisins, 1 cup sugar

Blend all ingredients except bread on high for 2 minutes.

Break up bread into chunks.

Pour the mixture over the bread, smashing the bread as you go. Make sure all the bread is soaked.

Place the sugar in a sauce pan and melt into caramel.

Pour caramel into bottom of baking pan and swirl to coat.

Pour mixture into pan.

Bake for 1.5 hours at 350 degrees.

---