Our 19 Best Bread Pudding Recipes for Using Up Stale Bread (2024)

FAQs

What can I do with a stale loaf of bread? ›

There are many ways to use stale bread in recipes, including French onion soup or grinding stale bread into savory breadcrumbs for venison meatballs or stuffed bell peppers. Satisfy a sweet tooth with French toast with apples and pecan or a dessert like bread pudding and Apple Brown Betty.

Stale bread holds its shape more easily when soaking up the custard mixture. Fresh bread tends to fall apart and turn to mush. If you don't have stale bread, you can heat cubed fresh bread in the oven to dry it out a bit.

One of the primary mistakes people make with bread pudding is that they remove it from the oven too soon or too late. If you take it out prematurely, the custard doesn't have the chance to cook, so it is still runny.

Can bread pudding sit out overnight? Do not let your bread pudding sit out at room temperature for more than 2 hours after it has been baked. You should make sure you eat it within 4 days.

Day-old bread is often used to make bread crumbs and if the bakery is also a cafe, the bread is sometimes used to make bread pudding or frittatas.

Bake about 1 hour or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Another way to judge whether the pudding is fully baked, is to gently press down on the center of the pudding. If any custard comes up to the top, the pudding needs to be baked a little longer.

After the 13th century, when the recipe started to include eggs, milk and a type of fat to soak the bread in, the dessert was more commonly referred to as 'bread and butter pudding' rather than 'poor man's pudding' before being shorted further to only 'bread pudding.

How to Store Bread Pudding. Allow the bread pudding to cool completely after baking. Cover tightly or transfer to a shallow, airtight container. Store in the refrigerator for up to three days.

You are probably cooking your egg dishes too hot for too long. Eggs contain a lot of water and also chains of proteins; if you could see them, the proteins would be coiled like little springs.

To check the inside to see if all the liquid has been absorbed, insert a knife into the middle of the pudding and create a small hole by pushing the bread to the side: If liquid begins oozing into the hole, it's not yet ready. If there's no liquid oozing, it's good to go. Read the original article on Tasting Table.

What is the best thickener for pudding? ›

Measure an alternative starch-based thickener, such as arrowroot powder, tapioca powder or rice starch, and combine it with the sugar called for in your pudding recipe. These alternative starches are comparable to cornstarch in thickening power, and twice as potent as wheat flour, so measure accordingly.

Cover the surface of the pudding with a round piece of parchment and refrigerate until the pudding reaches 45 degrees F, approximately 2 hours.

It is generally recommended to cover pudding in the fridge to keep it fresh and prevent it from drying out or absorbing unwanted odors.

Making Bread Pudding

It can be enjoyed straight out of the oven or cooled from the refrigerator (although I promise you, warmed-up is way better). I have also heard of a lot of people eating it as a breakfast dish, and I bet it is incredible with maple syrup and berries.

Any bread not affected by mold, but is simply getting dry or stale, can be eaten in any of a number of ways. You can make it into crumbs, which can be used as breading for fried food or binding for meat loaf. The crumbs can be completely dried and stored until needed.

Stale Bread and Stale Cereal Is Safe to Eat.

If there's no mold, it's fine to eat. You might consider making bread crumbs with stale bread, reviving it by running it under water and refreshing it in the oven, or add stale cereal into a snack bar recipe. There are lots of ways to waste less food.

The USDA advises discarding the entire loaf of bread if it has developed mold, as its roots can quickly spread in your bread. Additionally, some types of fungi produce harmful toxins.