Bread Pudding with Cherries and Homemade Caramel Sauce {recipe}

I have had a hankering for some hot, homemade bread pudding! I think it all started with the Slow Cooker Cook Book I bought at Borders. I opted to made it the traditional way vs. the slow cooker for my first time! I found a recipe in my Double Day Cook Book but tweaked it after talking the recipe over with my friend Amy, this morning. I am very anti-raisins so I decided to try dried cherries as a replacement. I also used a Vanilla Sauce recipe from Cooks.com but found it more to be a hot caramel sauce, much to my delight!

Here is the list of delights that made up the scrumptious bread pudding!

1 crusty baguette, cut into cubes
1/2 c dried cherries
3 eggs
1 cup milk
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp Cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1/4 c melted butter
1 tsp vanilla

Melt 1 tsp butter in a baking dish. Mix all (but the bread) in a bowl. Add the bread and the dried cherries to the custard-like mixture and soak it for an hour (you can add additional melted butter if you would like, into the mixture). After all the bread cubes are soaked, add the bowl of bread, cherries and custard mix to the greased baking dish and bake on 350 for 1 hour.

Sauce :

1/2 c sugar
1/2 c brown sugar
1/2 c heavy whipping cream
1 stick butter
1 tsp vanilla

Heat everything but the vanilla to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes, continuously whisking. Remove from heat and add vanilla.

Serve warm with hot caramel sauce! I think it would make a great breakfast or brunch treat but we ate it as a mid-afternoon snack!

Bon Appetite!
Rachel