Croissant Bread Puddings with Chocolate

Croissant Bread Puddings with Chocolate

Sometimes food seems to fly out of my kitchen. At other times, a food will take on a seemingly mysterious ability to last forever. The latter usually happens when I've been on a kick of indulging on an item until we are tired of it. Several years ago it happened with portobello mushrooms and I still can't look at one of those the same. More recently, I did it to myself with feta cheese--probably won't want any of that for a while. If I don't slow down on chickpeas, they will be next.

Of late, I have been on a mild croissant bender. Until I had to stop replenishing my croissant inventory and noticed that I had a few on hand that would need to be used or tossed in a day or two. (You know your bread has some age on it when you start checking for moldy spots.) I decided to use them for a bread pudding. I also spotted some Ghirardelli bittersweet chocolate chips (60% cacao) leftover from my Christmas baking and decided to use them too. The pudding was delicious, when puffy and still warm from the oven.

• Croissant Bread Pudding with Chocolate
• 7 - 8 cups leftover croissants or other bread, cut up or torn into bite-size pieces
• 1 cup chocolate chips
• Butter
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 quart milk
• 1 tsp. vanilla

Heavily butter a 3 quart shallow baking dish. Place the bread in the dish. In a mixing bowl, lightly beat the eggs then add the sugar. Whisk until well blended, then add the milk. Continue to whisk until evenly colored; stir in the vanilla. Pour the egg mixture over the bread and press down any bread that floats to completely saturate it. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 50 - 60 minutes, until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean.

The next day I was looking at the pudding. It was no longer puffed, but rather sunken, and very unattractive. I thought I'd cut it into squares to help the aesthetics, because the taste was great. Then I thought no, I'll take a biscuit cutter and cut it into rounds. Then, Hey, it's Valentine's Day, I'll cut it into hearts.

A little dusting of confectioner's sugar, and now it is pretty.