desserts – Peaceful Reader

Weekend Cooking; The holiday recipes

Ohhh, we had a lovely Thanksgiving Day, filled with good food and a visit from dear friends. I made a simple roast chicken, baked potatoes, roasted brussels sprouts, and fresh cranberries. Everything was easy to put together and I didn’t spend much time in the kitchen. The highlight was putting together 2 desserts; a sweet potato pie (which we much prefer over pumpkin) and bread pudding with bourbon sauce.

Bread Pudding recipe (adapted from an old Vegetarian Times recipe):
Oven at 350*

3 large eggs + 2 egg whites
1 cup skim milk
3/4 cup maple syrup
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
5 cups, cubed day old whole wheat bread (1/2 cubes/I say bite-sized)
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup dried cranberries

Whiskey Sauce:
1 cup brown sugar, 1/2 cup water, 1/4 cup bourbon

To assemble:

Whisk together first 7 ingredients. Fold in cubed bread, raisins, & cranberries. Let stand for 5 minutes or so to allow the custard to absorb into the bread.
Coat 9-in square pan with spray and spread mixture in pan. Bake 35-40 minutes until no egg mixture is bubbling up.
While it is baking make the sauce: In a small saucepan heat the water and brown sugar together. Boil on medium heat for two minutes. Remove from heat and add in bourbon. Boil two more minutes. Remove from heat and transfer to a small pitcher and allow to cool just a bit. Serve warm over bread pudding. Serve in bowls with homemade whipped cream on top. Yum!

We also started our day with a quick brunch that included homemade Bloody Mary’s. It was a trial run for another Christmas event that we always host that includes family friends and a hunt for an evergreen tree. Instead of buying Bloody Mary mix I wanted to try my own and found a keeper in this recipe. If you love Mary’s as we do, this recipe will make you smile and it was very easy.

One year I made fresh cranberries and I had a perfect recipe that used less sugar adding orange juice for flavor~I didn’t save the recipe (pre-Pinterest) and can’t find it but I did find this recipe and I just squeezed in a whole orange from my counter. I love, love the bright taste of this fruit and wonder why we don’t eat this all year long! I saved this recipe and will make it again at Christmas time for teenage boy who loves this crisp red berry as well.

Happy Weekend cooking! It’s just one short sleigh ride into Christmas…

This post is linked to Beth Fish Reads Weekend Cooking meme where she gathers together many other food-related posts.

28 Days of Things I Love; #3

I love milk and cookies!

It is my favorite dessert. I’ve even ordered it in a restaurant. I prefer really good homemade chocolate chip cookies but others will suffice. I like to dunk into a mini-coffee mug instead of a glass because I don’t need a lot of milk and the cookies fit better. The only brand of store bought cookies we buy are Matt’s, which have the same ingredients on the package as what I use in the kitchen. Just thinking about it makes me want to dunk a coupla’ cookies!

This dessert was a favorite of my dad’s and I can still see him at the head of our kitchen table with some of my mom’s cookies lined up ready for dunking. His second favorite dessert was chocolate cake in a bowl of milk. Yep. I love that also. Just perfect. Milk and cookies. Milk and chocolate cake. Ahhh.

When I googled an image for this post Jana’s blog, Milk and Cookies, came up repeatedly! No wonder I love reading her sweet blog.

Here’s hoping you have many cookies to dunk this month!

Thank you to my old friend Stanley for feeding my cookie dunkin’ love all through our Denver days!

Weekend Cooking;The yumminess that is Bread Pudding w/ Whiskey Sauce

Teenage Son wrapped in new quilt made by
amazingly talented mother-in-law!

This is one of my husband’s favorite desserts and so I whipped it up to celebrate our anniversary. I like bread pudding but the pull for me is the sauce! This recipe is from an old Vegetarian Times (Feb, 2009) and its been written in my favorite recipes book ever since.

(Image from VT)

Bread Pudding with Whiskey Sauce

3 large eggs

2 egg whites

1 cup skim milk

3/4 cup maple syrup

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp freshly ground nutmeg

5 cups cubed day old whole wheat bread, cut or torn into 1/2 in-cubes

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 cup dried cranberries

Whisk together first 7 ingredients. Fold in cubed bread, raisins and cranberries. Let stand 5 minutes for bread to absorb custard. Set oven to 350 degrees. Coat 9-in square baking pan with spray and spread bread mixture into pan. Bake 35-40 minutes until no egg mixture is bubbling up.

Whiskey Sauce:

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup whiskey

Add water and brown sugar to small saucepan. Bring to a boil on med-high and let boil for 2 minutes. Remove from heat and add whiskey. Boil 2 more minutes and then transfer to small pitcher. Let cool just a bit and serve warm over individual bowls of bread pudding. Add flavored whipped cream to top of bowl.

This is such an easy recipe for the delicious “ooohs” and “aahhhs” you will get when you serve it!

Weekend Cooking is a regular meme hosted by Beth Fish Reads-click to her link to find many more food-related posts and recipes.

Happy Cooking!!