Ina Garten’s Vanilla Bean Brioche Bread Pudding

Our Father’s Day celebration involved grilling and baked goods. We started the day with a mini-bundt cake version of Alton Brown’s Strawberry Muffins. There may have been some leftover Strawberry Crumb Cake on the side too. My husband loves strawberry season. 🙂

Because he has been excited about experimenting with his meat grinder, my husband wanted to make his own burger blend for dinner. (This time, he used a combination of beef brisket and chuck steak. It was a success!) I made curly fries, corn on the cob, and a green salad with ice box buttermilk dressing to serve on the side. I think that he really wanted me to have time to focus on this incredible dessert!

This bread pudding recipe was adapted from Cook Like a Pro: Recipes and Tips for Home Cooks- a Barefoot Contessa Cookbook by Ina Garten. The “pro tip” in this recipe was to use melted vanilla bean ice cream as a shortcut crème anglaise to drizzle over the top. It was rich, indulgent, and absolutely fabulous.

Yield: Serves 6 to 8

• 8 to 9 ounces brioche (I used 6 slices of Trader Joe’s brioche)
• 1 1/2 extra-large whole eggs (I divide an egg in half by weight)
• 4 extra-large egg yolks
• 2 cups half-and-half
• 1/2 cup whole milk
• 1/2 cup plus 2 T granulated sugar
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
• seeds scraped from 1/2 vanilla bean
• confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
• 7 ounces (1/2 pint) vanilla bean ice cream, melted, for serving (I used Häagen-Dazs)

1. Place the ice cream in a pitcher in the refrigerator to melt.
2. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, preferably on convection, with a rack in the center.
3. Cut six 3/4-inch slices of brioche. (Trader Joe’s brioche is pre-sliced.) Keep 3 1/2 slices whole. Trim the crusts from the remaining 2 1/2 slices; cut into 1-inch dice.
4. In a single layer, spread the whole slices and cut pieces of brioche on a rimmed sheet pan. Place in the preheated oven for 5 minutes, to lightly toast the bread.
5. Meanwhile, make the custard. Whisk the whole eggs, egg yolks, half-and-half, milk, granulated sugar, vanilla, and vanilla bean seeds in a large bowl, preferably with a spout. Set aside.
6. Line a 2-inch deep baking dish with the whole slices of brioche, cutting them to fit in a single layer. (I used a 9 1/2-inch round, ceramic baking dish. An 8×8-inch square dish, or equivalent, could be substituted.)
7. Distribute the diced brioche on top.
8. Pour the custard over the top of the bread and press down lightly so that the bread is soaked with custard. Set aside for 10 minutes.
9. Place the baking dish in a roasting pan large enough to allow the baking dish to sit flat. (I used a large roasting pan with handles. I also placed a silicone mat underneath the baking dish to prevent it from moving within the pan.)
10. Pour about 1 inch of the hottest tap water into the roasting pan, being sure not to get any water into the custard.
11. Cover the roasting pan tightly with aluminum foil, tenting the foil to make sure that it doesn’t touch the custard. Cut a few holes in the foil to allow steam to escape.
12. Bake for 45 minutes.
13. Uncover and continue to bake for an additional 30 to 35 minutes, until browned and set. Test by inserting a knife in the center- it should come out clean.
14. Dust with confectioners’ sugar. Serve warm, drizzled with melted ice cream.

Classic Bread Pudding

My husband requested bread pudding for his celebratory Father’s Day dessert this year. This classic dessert is second only to cheesecake in his heart. ❤

This isn’t technically another strawberry dessert… but the fresh strawberry topping definitely brought this fabulously creamy bread pudding to the next level.

The recipe was adapted from Martha Stewart.com. I omitted the raisins, modified the presentation, and added the fresh strawberry garnish. Delicious.

Yield: Serves 8 to 10

• 2 T unsalted butter, softened, for baking dish
• 12 ounces brioche or challah, cut into 1-inch cubes
• 2 cups whole milk
• 3 cups heavy cream
• 4 large eggs, plus 1 egg yolk
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 tsp coarse salt
• 1 T pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
• 1/2 cup raisins, optional (I omitted them)
• 1 cup boiling water, optional (if using raisins), plus more for pan
• fresh strawberry slices, for garnish, optional

1. Butter a 9-by-13-inch baking dish; set aside.
2. Put bread cubes in a large bowl; set aside.
3. Heat milk and cream in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat until just about to simmer; remove from heat.
4. Whisk eggs, yolk, sugar, salt, vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a medium bowl.
5. Whisking constantly, pour cream mixture in a slow, steady stream into egg mixture.
6. Pour over bread; fold to combine. Let stand 30 minutes, tossing and pressing occasionally to submerge bread.
7. Meanwhile, soak raisins in 1 cup boiling water for 30 minutes, if using. Drain; stir raisins into bread mixture. (I omitted the raisins.)
8. Preheat oven to 350 degrees, preferably on convection.
9. With a slotted spoon, transfer bread to buttered dish; pour remaining liquid in bowl over top. Using spoon, turn over some of the bread cubes so that they are positioned with the crust side up.
10. Set dish in a roasting pan; transfer to oven.
11. Pour boiling water into pan to reach about halfway up sides of dish. Bake until golden brown, about 45 to 50 minutes.
12. Let dish cool on a rack 10 to 20 minutes.

Note: For individual bread puddings, divide the mixture among eight buttered six-ounce ramekins; bake until golden brown, about 30 to 40 minutes.

Grilled Glazed Salmon & Bacon Sandwiches

More… Salmon! Easy and delicious. Grilled too. 🙂

This post is really belated. We ate these yummy sandwiches on Memorial Day… Thank goodness it’s still fabulous grilling weather! They were such a great alternative to standard holiday grilling menu items.

I served these sandwiches with German Potato Salad with Dill and Pasta Salad with Peas and Summer Beans on the side. For dessert, we enjoyed a Skillet Chocolate Chip Cookie (a family favorite!), Milk Bar Sugar Cookie-Cake Squares, and ice cream, of course! I almost forgot to mention our New York Soft Pretzel appetizer- yikes! It really was an All-American feast.

This recipe was adapted from a Food and Wine “staff-favorite” recipe, contributed by Marcia Kiesel. I served the sandwiches on brioche rolls but would opt for potato rolls next time. Too much bread for me! 😉

Yield: Serves 4

For the Glaze & Salmon:

• 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 1/4 cup prepared horseradish, drained
• 2 tablespoons honey
• four 6-ounce skinless salmon fillets
• canola oil, for rubbing
• coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper

1. Light a grill.
2. In a small bowl, mix the mustard, horseradish and honey.
3. Rub the salmon with oil and season with salt and pepper.
4. Grill the salmon over moderate heat, skinned side down, until lightly browned, about 3 minutes.
5. Turn and grill for 3 minutes longer, until the salmon is almost cooked through.
6. Turn the salmon again and spread each fillet with 1 tablespoon of the horseradish glaze.
7. Turn and grill until glazed, about 30 seconds.
8. Serve the remaining glaze on the sandwiches, below.

Note: As with any sweet glaze, brush the honey-horseradish-mustard sauce on the salmon in the last minutes of grilling, or else the sugars in it might burn.

For the Sandwiches:

• 4 kaiser, brioche, challah, or potato rolls—split, toasted and buttered
• 4 red lettuce leaves
• 8 thick bacon slices, cooked until crisp, as below
• 1/2 Granny Smith apple, cut into 12 thin slices

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, preferably on convection.
2. Place the bacon in a single layer, divided between 2- 9×13-inch pyrex dishes.
3. Bake for 30 or 35 minutes, until crisp. Remove from pans and place on a paper towel-lined, rimmed baking sheet to drain.
4. Spread the remaining horseradish glaze from the Grilled Glazed Salmon on the rolls.
5. Place a lettuce leaf, 2 crispy bacon strips and 3 slices of Granny Smith apple on each buttered roll and set a salmon fillet on top.
6. Close the sandwiches and serve.

One Year Ago:

• Simple Barbecue Sauce

Two Years Ago:

• Moroccan Chicken Brochettes with Garlic Sauce

Three Years Ago:

• Apple Cider Barbecue Sauce

Shrimp a La Mexicana Tacos

Let me tell you something… (This information may actually be quite obvious to some of you…) Cooking the shrimp in bacon drippings made this dish ultra-delicious. ULTRA. 🙂

I usually cook bacon in the microwave. (gasp!) I know that this may not be the best cooking method, but, as a complete neat freak, this method does eliminate a major cleanup. Fortunately, I pan-cooked a serious amount of bacon at some point in time and reserved the drippings. Yay! Perfect for these wonderful summertime tacos.

We ate these as a belated Father’s Day celebratory meal with skillet creamed corn, brown rice, and refried beans. The skillet corn consisted of fresh corn kernels which were also sautéed in bacon drippings. The mixture was then combined with a little bit of sour cream and seasoned with salt and pepper to taste. SO good.

My husband is a great dad and deserved a super tasty celebration. He always selects his menu and really wanted tacos on his special day for two reasons. Not only does he absolutely love tacos, but, after a thorough search, he gave me fabulous taco racks as part of my birthday gift- he really wanted me to use them ASAP. 😉

He found a local company that makes functional and pretty stainless steel taco racks: www.TacoRack.com. The racks make assembling and serving tacos so much easier. I have always needed such an item in my kitchen! A great birthday gift for me turned into a yummy Father’s Day meal for him. 😉

This recipe was adapted from Rick Bayless.com. Great.

I’m sharing with Angie’s Fiesta Friday #129 co-hosted by Jhuls @The Not so Creative Cook and Colleen @Faith, Hope, Love, & Luck. Enjoy!

Yield: Serves 4 generously

• 3 T lard, vegetable oil, bacon drippings, fat rendered from chorizo, or even butter
• 3 serrano OR one large jalapeño, stemmed
• 1 small yellow onion, diced
• 1 ripe medium-large tomato, cored and diced
• 1 pound shrimp, peeled, deveined, tails removed, and chopped into 1/2 inch pieces (I used large/21-25 per pound shrimp)
• a few sprigs cilantro, finely chopped
• a big squeeze of fresh lime juice
• 10-12 corn or corn & wheat tortillas, for serving

1. Melt the lard or other fat in a medium-size skillet set over medium heat.
2. Seed the chiles then chop them finely and add to the skillet, along with the onion and tomato. Cook, stirring frequently, until the onion has softened but is not brown, about 5 minutes. Reduce the heat to medium-low.
3. Add the shrimp to the skillet, letting the shrimp cook until they’re almost done through, about three minutes.
4. In the meantime, warm the tortillas in a tortilla warmer or on a plate covered by a moist paper towel and plastic wrap. (I place a damp paper towel over the tortillas in my tortilla warmer, cover, and microwave for 1 minute.)
5. Add a big handful of chopped cilantro and a squeeze of fresh lime juice, then scoop into a warm tortilla.

One Year Ago:

• Greens & Chayote Enchiladas with Salsa Verde

Two Years Ago:

• Chipotle Shrimp Tostadas
• Shortcut Enchiladas Verdes

Three Years Ago:

• Mexican Scrambled Egg & Bacon NYSSMA Celebration Tacos
• Cinco de Mayo Chicken Tinga Tacos

Spaghetti with Corn Carbonara & Crab

The first time I made this dish was for a special belated Father’s Day dinner. In the middle of cooking (thankfully on a gas stove…), there was a severe thunderstorm and resulting power outage. After my initial relief that I no longer needed electricity to complete the meal, I realized that I was in total darkness and couldn’t take a photo of this dish! Gasp! We did really enjoy eating it by candlelight though. 🙂

I had an excuse to make this dish a second time when my mom was visiting- she LOVES crab. 🙂 This time I was able to use fresh local bicolor corn from our farmers market. SO good! The sweetness of the corn is very important in this dish as it is barely cooked. We ate with a green salad loaded with CSA veggies. Mmmmm… healthy deliciousness!

This seasonal and tasty recipe was adapted from Food and Wine, contributed by Tim Maslow. I used a Vitamix to make the corn cream sauce and used pancetta instead of pork guanciale. The creamless corn sauce is not only healthy- it is unbelievably creamy. Lovely.

Yield: Serves 4 to 6

• 7 ears of corn, shucked
• 1 pound spaghetti
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1/4 pound diced pancetta
• 2 large shallots, minced
• 2 to 4 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
• 1 T fresh lemon juice, plus finely grated zest, for garnish
• coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 pound jumbo lump crabmeat
• extra-virgin olive oil, for serving

1. On a work surface, cut the corn kernels off of the cobs; using the sharp side of the knife, scrape the pulp off the cobs. You should have 4 cups of kernels and pulp. Transfer the kernels and pulp to a Vitamix or blender and puree until smooth.
2. Strain the puree through a fine sieve, pressing on the solids.
3. In a large saucepan of salted boiling water, cook the spaghetti until al dente. Reserve 2 cups of the cooking water, then drain the pasta.
4. Wipe out the saucepan and melt the butter in it. Add the pancetta and cook over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until the fat is rendered, about 7 minutes.
5. Add the shallots and garlic and cook, stirring, until softened, about 3 minutes.
6. Add the spaghetti, strained corn puree, 1 1/4 cups of the pasta cooking water and the lemon juice.
7. Cook over moderate heat, tossing, until the sauce is thickened and creamy, 3 to 5 minutes; add more of the cooking water if necessary.
8. Season the pasta with salt and pepper and very gently fold in the crab. Transfer to shallow bowls and drizzle with olive oil. Garnish with lemon zest, if desired, and serve right away.

Note: The strained corn puree can be refrigerated overnight.

One Year Ago:

• Spicy, Garlicky Cashew Chicken

Two Years Ago:

• Pinchos Morunos or Pork Kebabs with Moorish Seasonings
• Escalivada or Grilled Vegetable Salad with Parsley Vinaigrette
• Catalan Tomato Bread

Father’s Day Dulce de Leche Pecan Ice Cream

As much as I would have liked my husband to try something “new” for Father’s Day, he wanted our favorite tacos. I used my CSA chard and an entire bunch of local spinach in the filling- SO delicious!! The dessert was a surprise, so I could try a new recipe of a favorite flavor. 🙂

My husband and I were at the Montreal Jazz Festival listening to an outdoor concert the first time we tried Dulce de Leche ice cream. It was a Haagen Dazs version, on a stick. We fell so in love with it that I remember the moment. 🙂

I made this version with lightly toasted pecans to celebrate Father’s Day this year. I had made a gelato version in the past that required making homemade dulce de leche– this seemed like such a (wonderful!) shortcut version to incorporate store-bought dulce de leche into a custard base. It was really creamy and delicious. I ran out of time to make pizzelles and served it in waffle bowls instead!

This recipe was adapted from Williams-Sonoma Taste. Happy Belated Father’s Day to all of the Fathers and Grandfathers!  🙂

• 1 pint (2 cups) whole milk, plus 2 tablespoons, separated
• 1 pint (2 cups) heavy cream
• 8 egg yolks
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 13.4 oz cans Nestle LaLechera Dulce de Leche Caramel
• 1 cup raw pecan halves
• freshly ground pepper, optional

1. In a small sauce pan, heat one pint of milk and cream over medium heat until bubbles appear around the edge of the pan.
2. Meanwhile, in a medium stainless-steel bowl, beat egg yolks and sugar; then stir in warm milk mixture.
3. Return the custard mixture to the small sauce pan and cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until custard thickens and coats the back of a spoon, 170 degrees F, about 8 to 10 minutes.
4. Immediately remove from heat and strain through a fine-mesh sieve into a clean bowl. (While the custard is re-heating, I clean the original bowl and re-use it.)
5. Using a whisk, stir 1 can plus about 1/4 of the additional can of Dulce de Leche into the warm custard. 
6. Once incorporated, set bowl over an ice bath. Stir occasionally until cooled.
7. Cover with plastic wrap, pressing it directly on the surface of the custard, and let cool completely in the refrigerator, chill minimally 1 hour to overnight.
8. Pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees F. Spread pecans on a baking sheet; sprinkle with 1 tablespoon of water and season with freshly ground pepper, if using.
9. Roast until just toasted, 5 to 8 minutes. Let cool, then roughly chop. Set aside.
10. Churn chilled dulce de leche custard in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.
11. Fold in toasted pecans.
12. In a small bowl, whisk remaining dulce de leche with 2 tablespoons of milk to loosen, then fold into ice cream; dulce de leche should be mixed in just enough to form a marbled effect.
13. Place in an air-tight, freezer-proof container. Cover with plastic wrap, pressing it directly to the surface of the custard. Freeze until firm, a minimum of 4 hours to overnight. Let come to room temperature for 10 minutes prior to serving.

One Year Ago:

• Father’s Day Double Cookie Dough Ice Cream

Mustard-Herb Potato Salad

My husband had to work on Father’s Day, so we planned to have his special dinner belatedly the next day. I wanted to surprise him with a delicious pre-Father’s Day meal as well. It rained on my parade though…. instead of grilled chicken thighs with cilantro pesto we had baked chicken thighs, along with our favorite corn salad, his favorite caesar salad, and this mustard-herb potato salad. It was great! He had leftovers to bring to work on Father’s Day too. 🙂

This recipe was adapted from Everyday Food. Steaming the potatoes allows them to really keep their shape and makes a nice presentation.

Yield: 4 to 6 servings

• 1 1/2 pounds red new potatoes, scrubbed and halved (quartered if large)
• 1 tablespoon white-wine vinegar
• 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
• coarse salt and ground pepper
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley and/or dill

1. Place a steamer basket in a saucepan filled with 1 inch water. Bring to a gentle boil. Add potatoes. Cover, and cook just until tender, 15 to 20 minutes, tossing occasionally.
2. In a serving bowl, combine vinegar and Dijon; season with salt and pepper. Add hot cooked potatoes; toss. Let cool, tossing occasionally.
3. Add olive oil and herbs to cooled potato mixture. Season with salt and pepper, and toss.

One Year Ago:

• South Carolina Mustard Pulled Pork