Cooking with mother - Day 13

It was once again a Joe Wicks start to the day and I live streamed my workout - one way of encouraging myself to get back in to better shape! Then I had decided to go for something simple in the fancy dress and chose Rosie the Riveter from the US WW2 posters:

If anyone has any sensible suggestions for costumes then please comment! I have no idea how long I can keep this up....

After a maths tutoring session I had a lovely virtual tea break chatting to a friend in Lancashire. I am finding that I am speaking to so many different people whilst alone at home!

This afternoon I decided to use up some of the slightly stale bread to make another bread pudding. As my son won't eat dried fruit I decided to make a chocolate one instead. I modified the Delia Smith recipe to make up my own:

• 110 g (4 oz) bread with crusts cut off
• 135 ml (5 fl oz) of milk
• 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder
• 25 g (1 oz) of melted butter
• 35 g (1.5 oz) soft brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons nutmeg/cinnamon or mixed spice
• 1 medium egg beaten
• 100 g (3.5 oz) chocolate chips

1. Break the bread into suitable size pieces and put in a bowl.
2. Put the cocoa powder in a bowl and add a bit of the milk and mix to a paste.
3. Slowly add the rest of the milk and stir until mixed.
4. Pour over the bread, mix and leave it to soak in for about 30 minutes. [rest of recipe further down!]

I didn't want to waste the crusts I googled how to make croutons in the air fryer whilst waiting for the mixture to absorb. At this point my daughter FaceTimed me and decided she wanted to make some too. So I talked her through it whilst I was cooking:

1. chop bread into crouton sized pieces
2. melt butter in a pan
3. add some seasoning to the butter
4. toss the bread into the mixture and coat well
5. cook in the air fryer for 5 minutes at 200C

Look at how her's were better than mine:

There was still time to wait so I decided to chop up some of my vegetables and roast them:

I simply coated them in seasoned oil and then roasted at gas mark 6 (200 C) for 40 minutes, stirring twice.

Whilst they were cooking I carried on with the chocolate bread pudding:

1. Add the melted butter, sugar, spices and beaten egg to the bread mix well until it isn't lumpy.
2. Add the chocolate chips and mix in.
3. Put into a greased baking dish.
4. Bake at gas mark 4 (180C) for about 50 minutes.

This gave me time to put the roasted vegetables in a blender and add some vegetable stock (I used about 350 ml) before liquidising it:

The final chocolate bread pudding smelled divine when it came out:

I couldn't wait for my son to get back from his run so I quickly served myself a warm slice of pudding with some blueberries and cream:

My son said it was as good as something he would expect in a restaurant! Luckily it was big enough so that we each have a portion tomorrow too.