Brioche Bread Pudding + Quinoa, Fruit and Nut Salad

Valentine's Day Breakfast

Thank you so much for your comments on my last post.  I decided to go with the group consensus, and make the rest of my leftover brioche into a bread pudding.  When we lived in Chicago (back when I was still in graduate school and we seemed to have a lot more free time), Paul and I went out to brunch almost every weekend.  One of our favorite places was M. Henry.  They have the most amazing breakfast bread pudding.    I've been wanting to re-create it ever since.  This didn't come out nearly as good as theirs (I have a feeling they use more heavy cream than I want to think about it), but it was still delicious.  I started with a David Lebovitz recipe for dessert bread pudding which I've made before and is excellent (from Ready for Dessert).  I was going to follow the proportions, but it seemed like a lot of liquid and I couldn't bare to make another recipe that only used egg yolks (I already have eight frozen egg whites from making the chocolate truffle tartlet for TWD), so I basically winged it.  

I sliced up my last 7 bubble top brioche (a little more than 12 ounces), and chopped about a handful of ginger.  This summer we picked our own peaches and canned them in water, and I'm absolutely loving them right now.  It's amazing, but the liquid is thick, sweet, and syrupy and I didn't use any sugar at all.  I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't canned them  myself.  So, I opened a pint of peaches, drained them, and chopped them up.  I combined the peach liquid with some milk and a little bit of heavy cream I had left in the fridge, to make about 2.5 cups of liquid.  Then I added three whole eggs, vanilla, and honey, and whisked everything together.  I layered the bread, peaches, and ginger in a casserole dish, and poured the milk-eggs mixture on the top.  I let this sit in the fridge overnight.  In the morning, I put some raw sugar on top, and followed David's instructions to bake it in a water both (about an hour at 350).  I very rarely cook without much of a recipe, but I was thrilled with how this came out.  I think it's almost impossible to mess anything up that relies on brioche and cream!

Bread Pudding out of the oven

I also made the Quinoa, Fruit and Nut Salad for dinner one night this week.  I was very pleasantly surprised.  I thought it had great flavor for something so simple.  Paul was much less impressed.  He really doesn't like quinoa.  He'll eat it at my mother's house (he's a smart man!) but he's never happy when I make it.  Oh well.  He was a good sport and gave it a try!

Quinoa Salad, Greek Yogurt, and Pickled Cauliflower