Frosting & Froth

(Try saying that title five times fast.)

When my sister, brother, and I were kids, we were obsessed with a children’s cookbook filled with recipes fit for the budding food phenom. One recipe in particular struck our fancy, and we begged our mom to let us make it time and time again. It was a recipe for a simple bread pudding. Nothing fancy, just bread, milk, eggs, sugar, and cinnamon. I should note that the bread pudding itself was not anything to write (or blog) home about. It was plain, a bit bland, and really really mushy. Without the presence of heavy whipping cream and with the nonfat milk we used (my parents always bought skim), it was less pudding and more a lumpy, sweet soup. A dessert stew, if you will. But the recipe was incredibly easy to make and we always had the ingredients on-hand, so John, Carley, and I turned to it time and time again, particularly on rainy afternoons when there was nothing better to do than make bread stew in the toaster oven. One day, we were adventurous enough to whip up a bunch of batches of the stuff and attempt to sell it from a makeshift stand in our driveway. Our only paying customer was a cleaning product salesman who, in hindsight, was obviously attempting to win my mom’s affections and make a sale of his own (but my mom is more frugal than he was charming).

Needless to say, as I reached adulthood, bread pudding for me had all the appeal of a wet sponge. Memories of our kid’s cookbook bread pudding haunted me whenever I saw the dish on a restaurant menu or spied a piece of the stuff in a bakery window. Even though the bread pudding I came across as an adult exhibited little to no resemblance to the bread stew of my younger years, I routinely turned it down in favor of more reliable sweet treats like cookies, cake, and brownies.

But a few years ago, I decided to give the poor bread pudding another try. I found a recipe online and went to town with a half loaf of French bread left over from a pasta dinner the night before. Never before had crusty, day-old bread tasted so delicious. The gentle melding of bread, spices, cream, sugar, and eggs was a quiet, melodious quintet in my mouth, and my tastebuds sang in joyful harmony. Was this what I had been missing all of those years, spooked by my childhood memories of bread pudding as a runny, tasteless kind of sludge? Darn that kid’s cookbook! This stuff was amazing!

Last week, I was brainstorming pumpkin-centric baking ideas (yes, I’m mildly completely obsessed with pumpkin), and thought, hey, why not create a lightened-up pumpkin bread pudding? And then the stroke of genius. Why not add a generous handful of creamy peanut butter chips to the mix? What I ended up with was nothing short of the perfect October treat: a pumpkin peanut butter bread pudding, thick and teeming with wonderful fall flavors, including maple, vanilla, and clove. Topped with a cloud of whipped cream and dusted with a shaking of cinnamon, it’s a far cry from my early attempts at the traditional dish.

My husband giggled rather wickedly as he took his first bite, giddy at the discovery that day-old bread could taste this rich and, well, naughty. And if that doesn’t pique your interest, I don’t know what will.

Pumkin’ PB Bread Puddin’

cooking spray
5 cups day-old French bread, cubed
6 tbsp. unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups light vanilla soy milk (I used Silk brand)
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
3/4 cup pumpkin puree
1/4 cup agave (or 1/2 cup sugar)
1 tbsp. pure maple syrup
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
1/4 tsp. pure vanilla extract
1/3 cup peanut butter chips
whipped cream and cinnamon to taste (for garnish)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8 x 8 baking pan lightly with cooking spray. Heat butter in the microwave for approximately 30 seconds or until melted. Place cubed bread in large mixing bowl and pour melted butter over bread. Toss until bread is lightly coated with butter. In a small bowl, add next ten ingredients (through vanilla) and whisk until combined. Pour wet mixture over bread and fold gently until bread is coated. Add peanut butter chips and fold to incorporate. Place mixture in prepared pan and bake for approximately 30 minutes or until pudding is set. Allow to cool for 15-20 minutes before cutting. Plate and top with a dollop of whipped cream and a dash of cinnamon, if desired.

Eat, giggle, enjoy.

Whenever I’m feeling nostalgic, I think of my grandma, Marilyn. She was the perfect, so-small-you-wanted-to-place-her-in-your-pocket Portuguese grandmother. Quiet, kind, and endlessly patient, she allowed her grandchildren open access to her kitchen whenever we visited. Oreos and milk at ten in the morning? You got it! Eggs and Vienna sausage at eleven in the evening? Just let me warm the frying pan. A glistening box of donuts from Stan’s, the pink cardboard nearly soaked through with crackling, sweet glaze? A weekend staple she happily provided.

My grandmother taught me to love food, to think of it as a means of communion with family and friends. In my grandmother’s house, food brought people together. We swapped stories over her salted cod and shared both our joys and sorrows over her famous beef stew. The latter became her signature dish, not because it was extravagant or complex, but because it was simple, warm, sustaining, and good, just like my grandmother. It filled our bellies the way her presence filled our hearts—to the very brim and spilling over.

Tonight, I cooked up my version of her hearty chicken stew, making use of a fall favorite—sweet potatoes—in place of the standard Russet variety. I also supplemented her no frills, salt-and-pepper seasoning method with warm, autumnal selections of all spice, cinnamon, ginger, and clove. What I ended up with was a comforting bowl of rich, sweet stew, a wonderful melding of her tastes and my own. As I tucked into my portion, a thick slice of French bread at the ready to lap up the juices, I thanked my grandmother for providing me with unending sustenance, not only for a growling stomach, but for a hungry soul.

Marilyn-in-Autumn Chicken Stew

Serves 3-4

1 tablespoon canola oil
2 chicken breasts (cut into 1-inch cubes)
1 yellow onion (diced)
2 cups chicken broth
2 cups + 3 tbsp. water (divided)
1 tomato (diced)
1 cup carrots (chopped)
2 medium sweet potatoes (peeled and cubed)
2 tsp. sea salt (divided)
1 tsp. black pepper (divided)
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. all spice
1 tsp. ginger powder
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
3 tbsp. all-purpose flour

Warm canola oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add chicken and cook until all sides are browned (chicken will cook further as stew simmers). Season chicken with 1 tsp. sea salt and 1/2 tsp. black pepper. Add onions and cook until onions are tender and translucent, stirring occasionally. Add chicken broth and 2 cups water. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat to a simmer. Add diced tomatoes. Allow to simmer for 45 minutes. Add sweet potatoes, carrots, the rest of the salt and pepper, and all of the remaining seasonings, through cloves. Simmer for 10 minutes. In a small prep bowl, mix flour with 3 tbsp. water. Mix with a fork until all lumps are removed. Add flour and water mixture to pot and stir until incorporated. Allow stew to continue to simmer for 5 minutes. Serve with fresh, crusty French bread and let your soul be warmed.