Savory Bread Pudding with Gruyere, Bacon, Onion, and Nettles

Inspired by my visit to Serpentine (www.serpentinesf.com, highly recommended). Brooks and Co. in the kitchen change up the recipe seasonally and their early June offering was Fennel Savory Bread Pudding. I was going to a bacon-themed pot luck and was making something non-bacon so I made this additional dish as kind of an afterthought.

 

Mark's Version of Savory Bread Pudding

 

Base:

1 whole baguette, a bit stale, cubed (I used an Acme "rustic"), about 5-6 cups

4 eggs

2 cups milk (replace some with heavy cream for richness)

Hunk gruyere, grated (1/2 cup?)

1/4 cup fine grated parm

1/2 teaspoon salt

Grinds pepper

 

Filling:

One yellow onion, chopped

5 strips bacon, chopped

Handful roughly chopped nettles

Pinch Thyme

2 tablespoons butter

 

Instructions:

Put butter in medium pan and allow to slightly brown. Fry onion and bacon in the butter until onion is soft / slightly golden, bacon is slightly crisp. Add nettles to wilt and the thyme, remove from heat. Lightly beat eggs, add milk (,cream), salt, pepper, and everything from the fry pan. Add bread, stir, let soak for ~20 minutes turning occasionally so the bread absorbs evenly. Bake in a greased 8" square pan at 350 for 30-45 minutes until inside is clean when poked with fork. (mine was terribly stuck in because I forgot to grease)

 

Notes:

-to protect the top from burning you can start with foil over it for the first 10-15 min.

-for protection against overcooking the edges you can cook it in a water bath (suggestion from brooks)

-when using other filling which is more moist (like more veg) cut back on the milk a bit.

Done