Jelly Donut and Cherry Beer Bread Pudding

We debuted this recipe at The Top of the Hops Beer Festival in Jackson MS last weekend for Tom's Sam Adams University Beer Pairing Seminar.  We paired it with the Sam Adams Cherry Wheat and it was a big hit! 

1 loaf crusty French bread
1 dozen glazed donuts
6 cherry jelly donuts
3 cups whole milk
1 6 oz. bag dry cherries
1 bottle Sam Adams Cherry Wheat beer
3 sticks unsalted butter
2 cups brown sugar
1/4 cup confectioner’s sugar
2 Tbsp. vanilla extract
1 Tbsp. cinnamon
½ tsp. ground nutmeg
6 large eggs
¼ tsp. salt

Prep
Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees. Break the bread and donuts into 1” cubes and place in a large mixing bowl. Melt 2 sticks of butter in a large glass bowl. To the melted butter add; brown sugar, granulated sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt and beer. Mix thoroughly until sugar is dissolved. Add sugar mixture and eggs to the bread and blend with your hands until evenly distributed. Add enough milk to moisten all of the bread and mix thoroughly with your hands. Add cherries and pecans and mix again until evenly distributed. Add more milk until all of the bread is wet but no milk is standing in the bowl. This last part is tricky, but trust your instincts and practice. Too much milk is less of a disaster than too little, so err on the heavy side. Spoon the mixture into a greased roasting pan or high-side baking dish and spread evenly around the pan. Cut the butter into ten or twelve pats and place evenly on the top of the mixture. Sprinkle the mixture with ½ of the confectioner’s sugar.

Cook
Bake in 375 degree oven for 45 minutes. Remove and allow to cool for at least 15 minutes.

Plate
Cut the pudding into squares and place in a shallow bowl. Top with confectioners sugar.

(Serves 12)

Dinner with Friends

Tonight, Kitty and I were lucky enough to be invited to dine with Mandy, Sid, Amy and Monte at Mandy and Sid's home. Monte and Amy brought a fantastic salad prepared from our good friends at Broad Street Baking Company. Sid and Amy picked up ice cream and Kitty and I brought v1.0 of a new soup that I am working to develop. The recipe below is v1.2, but the pictures are of the prototype. See if you can figure out the changes. If you can get them right, I'll award yo with a sample of my new Ivy & Devine Seafood Seasoning Blend, which is yet to hit the shelves.
The nexus of this soup derives from that last bite of steak on your plate at Char or Tico's or Shappley's. You know the one...when you use the one remaining sliver of beef to Zamboni around your plate and pick up the last smear of mashed potatoes, the last leaves of creamed spinach and the last drops of mushroom sauce. In one perfect morsel on the end of your fork you get the melding of the entire steakhouse experience.
Since I've been messing around with deconstructions lately, I wanted to see if I could create a dish that gave the diner this exact experience over and over again. The only thing I could come up with was soup. so give it a try and let me know if it lives up to the mark.

The dessert was featured in today's Jackson Free Press. They were doing a story on the Muppets' creator, Jim Henson (a fine Mississippi boy from Leland, way up in the Delta) and asked me for an appropriate dish. What I came up with was Ice Cream Sandwiches for Grover. You can get the recipe here, or wait a week and come back to this blog (publishing rights and what-not). At our dinner gathering, Amy, who had read the article today, kiddingly asked if we were having this dish for dessert. After a quick survey of Sid and Mandy's kitchen, the answer was YES (with only one short trip to McDade's).
Bon Appetit!
~Tom
Steakhouse Soup

2 large yellow onions

2 whole garlic pods

2 leeks

6 large Yukon gold potatoes

1 6 oz. bag fresh spinach

1 flatiron steak

1 tsp. Ivy & Devine Creole Seasoning Blend

2 Tbsp. mushroom base*

4 Tbsp. Dales Steak Seasoning

1 qt. heavy cream

2 qt. beef stock

1 bunch green onions

1 bunch parsley

4 Tbsp. olive oil

½ stick butter

1 baguette French bread

Salt

Pepper

Prep

Roughly chop onions and leek bottoms. Cut potatoes into 1” cubes. Chiffonade spinach. Finely chop parsley. Season steak liberally with Ivy & Devine Creole Seasoning Blend. Slice through the tops of the garlic (about ¼ inch cut), drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and butter, then wrap individually in foil. Slice Baguette into ½ in crostini. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cook

Toast crostini in hot oven until gold around the edges. Remove and set aside. Place foil wrapped garlic pods in hot oven. Heat a large stock pot over medium heat and then add 2 Tbsp. olive oil. Allow the oil to heat and then add onions and leeks. Cook until onions are translucent. Add 1 qt. beef stock and simmer. Remove garlic from foil and squeeze out the roasted cloves into the stock pot. Heat a large iron skillet and add olive oil. When the oil is hot, add steak and cook until medium rare (approximately 5 minutes per side). Remove steak and deglaze with equal parts water and Dales Seasoning. Allow meat to rest and add deglazing liquid to the stock pot. Add spinach, mushroom base and remaining beef stock. In a separate large pot combine potatoes with enough water to cover. Add 1 tsp. salt to the water and bring to a hard boil. Reduce heat to a light boil and cook for ten minutes. Drain water and mash potatoes with ½ stick of butter. Finish potatoes by whipping with an immersion blender until creamy and completely free of lumps. Add potatoes to stock pot. When meat is fully rested, cut into cubes and set aside. Add any liquids remaining on cutting board to the soup mixture. Add cream and allow mixture to come to a simmer. Remove from heat and add steak and green onions. Salt and pepper to taste.

Plate

Serve immediately in a large, shallow bowl. Top with toasted crostini and garnish with chopped parsley.

(Serves 8-10)

*I recommend a brand called Better than Bouillon.