Author Notes
Ah, the great frustration of Food52. In thinking about this week's contest, I had a genius mashup idea to make a breakfast bread pudding. Yum - leftover challah and homemade breakfast sausage. I was sure I was onto some thing amazing! I googled bread pudding recipes to get the egg-milk ratio since I've never made bread pudding before.... Yah, aargersi made it back, like, 4 years ago. And, to add insult to injury, it looked freaking amazing (cream cheese was an awesome idea, btw). But by then it was too late, I was stuck on the idea of bread pudding. Because it's bread pudding. So I figured, why not waffles? With homemade blueberry syrup. Oh goodie!
I declined to do a search for waffle bread pudding on account of being super sensitive and not feeling like I could handle the disappointment.
The blueberry syrup recipe was adapted from Food and Wine circa 2010. Some general ratio/methodology from aargersi on account of her having the brilliant idea I had today...about four years ago. —Niknud
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Ingredients
- Waffle Bread Pudding
-
Bacon! (I used ~6 pieces but let your conscience be your guide. There's no such thing as too much bacon. No, really.)
-
6-7 cups
torn waffles (I used Aretha Frankensteins Waffles of Insane Greatness)
-
8
eggs
-
2 cups
milk
-
1 cup
cream
-
1 teaspoon
black pepper
-
butter or bacon grease for the pan
-
blueberry syrup (recipe below)
-
Bloody Mary
- Blueberry Syrup
-
.75 pounds
blueberries, rinsed
-
2 cups
water, divided
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1 cup
sugar
-
3
1" strips of lemon peel
-
.5 teaspoons
lemon zest
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1.5 tablespoons
fresh lemon juice
Directions
- Waffle Bread Pudding
-
Fry bacon and drain on paper towel. When it's cool enough to handle, chop into ~1/2" pieces. If you would like to, you may go ahead and grease your 8x11 baking pan with leftover bacon fat (recommended!) or with butter.
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Mix eggs, milk, cream and pepper in a bowl. You should add salt here if you're not using bacon, but I left it out on account of salty-bacon goodness.
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Put half of the waffle pieces on the bottom of your greased pan and generously sprinkle with bacon pieces. I won't judge if you hum, "It's raining bacon, hallelujah!" under your breath while doing this. I do. Pour half of the eggy mixture on top. Repeat.
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Cover your pan and refrigerate overnight.
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The next morning, preheat your oven to 350. Drizzle 1/4-1/2 cup of blueberry syrup over the top and cook until the eggs are set and the pudding is nice and deep brown and puffy - about 70-90 minutes. If the waffles start to get too crispy before the eggs are set, cover with foil for the last bit of cooking.
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Serve with a Bloody Mary because it's a weekend morning and the pudding is super rich. If you're making this on a weekday, you are far too much of a go-getter and I dislike you on principle. Oh yah, and extra blueberry syrup because, duh.
- Blueberry Syrup
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In a pot, combine the blueberries with .5 cup water. Smash up the blueberries and bring to a simmer. Simmer over low heat for 15 minutes. Strain blueberries, pressing on the skins to get as much liquid out as possible. Discard the skins.
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Rinse de pot. Combine sugar, lemon zests and remaining 1.5 cups water and bring to a boil, stirring to dissolve sugar.
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Boil the syrup over medium heat until it registers 225 on a candy thermometer, about 20 minutes. Add blueberry and lemon juices and boil over high heat for 1 minute. Let it cool then discard the lemon peels.
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Note: The syrup may set up a bit overnight in the fridge. Just pop in the microwave for a few seconds to warm it up and thin the consistency.
Full-time working wife and mother of two small boys whose obsessive need to cook delicious food is threatening to take over what little free time I have. I grew up in a family of serious cookers but didn't learn to cook myself until I got married and got out of the military and discovered the joys of micro-graters, ethiopian food, immersion blenders and watching my husband roll around on the floor after four servings of pulled pork tamales (with real lard!) complaining that he's so full he can't feel his legs. Trying to graduate from novice cooker to ranked amateur. The days of 'the biscuit incident of aught five' as my husband refers to it are long past but I still haven't tried my hand at paella so I'm a work in progress!
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