Apple and Cinnamon Bread Pudding
English bread pudding is made from a mixture of stale - usually wholemeal - bread, milk, dried fruit, and spices, which produces a dark, dense, intensely spicy cake that can be eaten warm with custard or cold with tea or coffee. Bread pudding takes variations with abandon. It’s just as wonderful with dried apricots, cherries, or even mangoes, as it is with the traditional raisins and sultanas. And it’s absolutely fabulous turned into an apple and cinnamon bread pudding.
I’ve had a thing for apple and cinnamon bread pudding ever since I found it in the bakery on the corner of Princess Avenue in Tolworth. Big chunks of dark, dense cake studded with apples and dried fruit and sprinkled thickly with sugar beckoned from behind the counter. Since it wasn’t a cake I was familiar with, of course I had to try it. I found it spicy, chewy and - despite an excess of raisins - not overly sweet. It was also inexpensive, so for two students on a limited budget it became an often-sought treat when we were in need of a pick-me-up or when something had gone particularly well.
Chunks of Apple and Cinnamon Bread Pudding After Cooling © essentially-england.comBread pudding - whether the traditional or the fruit-laced version - was sturdy enough to be taken on cycling training rides. And I’m sure it even made a welcome snack during a race or two. But it wasn’t until I was leafing through my recipe collection that it occurred to me that I hadn’t made apple and cinnamon bread pudding in ages. I imagine it got lost in my attempt to reduce my carb intake. But I’ve since learned that excess can go both ways, and moderation is the name of the game.
Which is why I’m officially resurrecting my love of apple and cinnamon bread pudding.
My grandmother, who was a fantastic cook, lived through two World Wars and was familiar with thrift in the kitchen, with making use of every scrap, of not letting anything go to waste and still being able to feed the multitudes when the cupboards were bare. I’m convinced that I’ve inherited my love of hearty soups from her. And I’m thinking that had she ever come across bread pudding, and I’m not sure that she did, because it wasn’t a dish I ever saw in Germany, she would have heartily approved of it.
The wartime version might have contained little more than fallen apples, since I imagine that raisins and sultanas were expensive and highly prized items. That instead of liberally sprinkling cinnamon and spice into the mixture, a stick of cinnamon would have been stored in the closely guarded stash of sugar to impart its flavour that way. And the apple and cinnamon bread pudding wouldn’t have been made with fresh bread, of course, but with leftover crusts and stale heels, softened with water and beaten until it turned to mush.
Maybe that’s one of the reasons I love bread pudding, because it is such an unassuming dish, one that you can dress up or down, depending on what’s in the cupboard, but that still tastes just as good.
Piping Hot Apple and Cinnamon Bread Pudding Straight out of the Oven © essentially-england.comIt’s an easy dish even for novice bakers and doesn’t need anything by way of equipment. But if you’re utterly new to baking, I’ve put together a list of basic equipment, which you can check out here if you shop at amazon US, or here if you’re in the UK.
For this recipe, a big mixing bowl and a square cake tin will do just fine.
Here is what
you need to make Apple and Cinnamon Bread Pudding
- 450g wholemeal bread
- 600ml milk
- 75g dried fruit
- 115g melted butter
- 175g dark or light muscovado sugar
- 2 tsp mixed spice
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 2 medium eggs, beaten
- 75g ready-to-eat prunes, roughly chopped
- Finely grated rind and juice of one orange
- 2 apples, peeled, cored, and roughly chopped
- ½ teaspoon grated nutmeg
- 3 tablespoons demerara sugar
Apple and Cinnamon Bread Pudding Ready for the Oven © essentially-england.com
How to Make
Apple and Cinnamon Bread Pudding
Tear your bread into pieces and place in a large bowl. If your bread has a very thick, sturdy crust, you can remove it. I like to keep mine, but cut it very thinly, so it softens along with the rest of the bread.
Add the dried fruit and milk and leave to soak for at least half an hour.
While the bread is soaking, lightly grease a 20cm square cake tin and line it with baking parchment. Then pre-heat your oven to 180°C / 350°F / Gas 4.
Next, beat the soaked bread until it breaks down to mush, then add the remaining ingredients except the demerara sugar and mix until well combined.
A note on the apples: you can use either cooking or dessert apples. Cooking apples will disintegrate while the bread pudding is baking and will result in a slightly denser, moister cake. Eating or dessert apples will keep their shape and leave small, bright specks of fruity goodness in the spicy, dense matrix of the cake.
A note on the sugar: When I grew up, sugar came from sugar beet and was white and granulated or white and powdered. Cane sugar has many more variations depending on the way it’s been processed and its molasses content and using different types of sugar can add character and flavour to a dish, as we do here by adding dark or light muscovado sugar to give depth to our bread pudding, while the demerara sugar sprinkled on the top gives a satisfying crunch. However, in the greater scheme of things, sugar is still sugar. So, if white and granulated is all you have, worry not. Your apple and cinnamon bread pudding will still taste great!
Pour the mixture into the prepared cake tin and level the top. Sprinkle with the demerara sugar.
Bake for 1-11/4 hours until the bread pudding is firm to the touch.
Turn out and remove the lining paper.
You can serve your apple and cinnamon bread pudding immediately, warm from the oven with custard or double cream as a substantial end to a light meal. Or you can leave it to cool completely and serve as a mid-morning or mid-afternoon snack with tea or coffee.
How do you keep your recipes?
Are you a passionate cook or baker with a treasure trove of old, beloved recipes scattered around your kitchen? Let me help you organise and preserve your culinary heritage in style.
These elegantly designed blank recipe notebooks don't take up much room, but with their user-friendly layout and durable design, they offer plenty of space for your recipe collection. This recipe keeper notebook is your perfect kitchen companion. And filled with their favourite recipes it makes a great gift for children heading to college - or even as a wedding gift.
I hope you enjoyed this recipe for apple and cinnamon bread pudding. If you’re up for experimentation, you can vary the types of apples you use, play around with the level of spiciness, or even replace the prunes with dried apricots. Each alternative will produce a bread pudding with a distinct taste and you can choose the one that appeals to you the most. It’s something I love to do, and I use my blank recipe collection notebooks to record my successes and failures, just as my gran used to do in the recipe book I inherited from her.
Essentially England uses affiliate links. This means that if you purchase something through a link on this site, we may earn a commission (at no extra cost to you).
