White Chocolate Bread Pudding

Here is the most decadent white chocolate bread pudding recipe for your next special occasion or holiday!  Easter brunch or dinner preparations are well underway in some places (I’m looking at you, Pinterest), and this would be a great dessert to round out your meal, especially if you’ve been fasting or abstaining in some form for Lent!  It’s the best ‘Welcome Back to Indulgence aka Sugar-Land’ dessert out there.This is actually a recreation of one of my very favorite desserts in the whole world, from one of the only chain restaurants I will willingly eat at, Biaggi’s.  It’s so good that, no matter how full I am, I will not leave without eating this dessert.  One time, my friend and I went SPECIFICALLY for the bread pudding, telling the waiter that as soon as we sat down.  We begrudgingly eating an actual meal at the restaurant before dessert; excitedly, we told the waiter we wanted two bread puddings please and he proceeded to tell us THEY WERE OUT (!!!!!!).  ADLKSJFL;QIEPORU’SDJFL;ASDJFL;ADKSLPBIOP!!!!  Also, this was not the first time this had happened to me…After this most awful experience, I knew I had to have my own recipe for this classic dessert because I obviously could not reliably count on the restaurant to come through for me.  I tried a few recipes before settling on this one as the best possible version; it’s so rich, comforting and full of white chocolate!  I serve this full-on Biaggi’s-style, with crème anglaise, dark chocolate shavings and strawberries.Bread puddings are actually quite easy to make and come together rather quickly, plus they’re great make-ahead desserts because they always benefit from a long soak in the custard.  Stale brioche or challah are best for this as they’re basically built for sweet applications because they are enriched with butter, sugar and eggs.  Enriched breads will toast up to golden-brown perfection in the oven. To start, cube the bread and toss with melted butter.  Some of the white chocolate is added in chunks to enhance the bread pudding, and some is melted into the custard that soaks the bread to really penetrate the entire dessert.  Sprinkle the top with sugar right before baking; this will form a crisp, sugary crust!  The final result is a soft, custardy interior with a crisp, sugary crust…heavenly.This is good enough to make me forget that oft-betraying ol’ friend and make this on the regular at home!

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