Pumpkin Bread Pudding

Pumpkin Bread Pudding
Dorcas Annette Walker

A hand-written letter sent in the mail has almost become obsolete with how most people correspond with others. While I still occasionally send out a note written by hand, I’ll have to confess that emailing is a lot quicker and easier for me. Communicating through cyber space is not without its perils though. I first signed up with yahoo email. A couple years passed without any problems. Suddenly one day my phone started ringing as friends from out-of-state began calling asking what was going on. Someone had hacked into my email account and was sending out frantic letters asking for money using my name telling folk that I was stranded in Africa. After a couple of months yahoo was able to run this person down. I started a new email account, but was left shaken at the thought of being sabotaged again. By then my local telephone company had email accounts so I signed up with them, changed all my addresses, and notified my editors. Months passed by and once more I began to relax. Lo and behold if I didn’t discover that randomly people posting emails to me would get their emails returned with my address blocked. A friend of mine using the same telephone company would sometimes have to send an email to me three or four times before it would go through. I called the technical support a couple of times about this problem. The last support fellow I talked with, stating my frustration and trying to impress upon him the vital importance for me to be able to be in contact with my editors and them with me, I was told that the only way they could completely solve the problem was for me to forward the blocked emails. I hung up the phone feeling quite confused. How I am to get a hold of emails that never even come to me is beyond my understanding. Maybe the local company thinks that I have psychic powers. So I have signed up with gmail after being assured by friends that using gmail will solve all my email problems. We shall see. You can now reach me at: dorcasannettewalker@gmail.com

Thankfully food is one way of interaction that never fails. You can count on smiles of satisfaction whenever you prepare a lip-smackin dish. Not only does food satisfy a basic human need, but it also gives comfort along with an artistic touch. My Pumpkin Bread Pudding is a new twist to an old dish that makes a perfect fall dessert. You can add raisins or pecans to the Pumpkin Bread Pudding, and drizzle Carmel, honey, or maple syrup over it before serving. Preparation time is fifteen minutes (not counting baking time) and this recipe serves twelve.

Pumpkin Bread Pudding

12 slices of wheat bread
4 c milk
6 eggs
2 c or 1 (15 oz) can of pumpkin
1 c brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla
1 tb pumpkin spice
¼ tsp cinnamon
pinch of salt
powdered sugar

Cut bread into 1 inch cubes and place in a buttered 9x 13 baking dish. In a medium-size bowl beat until smooth: the milk, eggs, pumpkin, vanilla, spices, and salt. Pour over the bread, sprinkle with cinnamon, and bake at 350º for one hour (covered with tinfoil for the first 30 minutes) until a knife inserted in the middle comes out clean. Dust with powdered sugar and serve!

Weekly tip: For an even crunchier bread pudding texture, toast the bread before cubing!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, columnist, speaker, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcasannettewalker@gmail.com For more recipes check out her Creative Tennessee Mountain Cookin blog at: www.dorcasannettewalker.webs.com