Several of our staffers gathered in Brooklyn to try their hand at making dishes from Laurie Colwin's classic Home Cooking. The "chefs," seasoned and novice alike, will be sharing their experiences every Monday on the Open Road Media blog.
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I almost never cook, so when choosing a recipe, I needed to find something that would be relatively simple. I had never had chocolate bread pudding before, but I was a fan of regular bread pudding. I was also looking forward to making a dessert that didn’t come from a box. Yet it proved harder than I initially thought, since there was no actual recipe for the bread pudding in Home Cooking.
Colwin writes, “any standard cookbook has a recipe for bread pudding” and adds her own adjustments. I discovered it’s really hard to find a “standard” recipe for bread pudding, and even more difficult to find one that will go well with chocolate. I settled on a combination of recipes from Alton Brown and Martha Stewart (both expert chefs, ironically).
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In true Laurie Colwin form, the remainder of the recipe was mostly improvised except for the bake time and temperature. Once I had created my own recipe to follow, the process went smoothly. Learning how to temper eggs was pretty exciting for me; I consider this to now be the only “fancy” technique I know.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Image may be NSFW.
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The dessert came out way more amazing than I ever thought it would, and I’m really looking forward to making it again and eating the whole thing myself.
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