Chocolate Chip Bread Pudding

Asked by sonjamc. Answered on 28th December 2012

Full question

In Nigella's Kitchen book, there is a recipe for Chocolate Chip Bread Pudding. However I'm not sure what type of bread is best to use. Is it possible to use brown bread or is white bread preferable? Also, is there a preference for batch bread? I read somewhere that regular sliced doesn't work very well.

Our answer

For bread puddings in general white bread would normally be used, though it is very much an issue of personal preference and you could use a brown or wholemeal type if you really wanted to. We would avoid the very soft regular white sliced loaves as these don't have the best texture to absorb the egg and cream mixture. Instead we would suggest trying to use a loaf with a slightly open texture and coarser crumb, such as a white farmhouse loaf.

The most important thing though is that the bread is stale. If you leave the slices of bread on a wire rack overnight then they should stale more quickly, or use a loaf that is 2 to 3 days old. The slices of bread should feel slightly dry. At this time of year you can also find chocolate chip pannetone and pandoro breads and these would also be great alternatives to use in the pudding, particularly if you have some leftover from Christmas.