Bread Pudding (Large Batch) with Sarah's Cinnamon Syrup

Well, I kept stashing away stale bread, bread duds (my husband doesn't like the breadmaker bread),  a few hotdog buns and some breakfast bread with dried fruit my Mom gave me and some burnt toast in the freezer.

While searching through the freezers to see what was actually in there, I found I had a half dozen different bags of bread stashed away! Meijer, our local grocery store is finally carrying their own line of organic bread, among other things, but it is not taking off as well as it should and I forget to check the date in the store... so a loaf usually only lasts a couple days before it doesn't taste fresh anymore. Even a couple days before the date. Which, is fine, I'd hate to think they filled it with tons of preservatives anyway. So, in the freezer these quarter loaves go.

Today I pulled them all out, chopped them up into bite sized pieces and found I had 30 cups worth! So, I did some searches online. I wanted one with lots of fruit and eggs and little sugar. Honey, molasses fine. I found this one: http://www.food52.com/recipes/8092_ginger_spice_bread_pudding
and this one: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/bread_pudding/
and some others, and then kinda did my own thing. Of course. :)

So, I had a dozen eggs I needed to use up, put that in a bowl with almost 2 cups of organic milk, 2 cups of organic coffee, 2 cups of plain organic yogurt, 1/2 cup of molasses, 1/2 cup honey, 1/3 cup of raw, organic cane sugar, 3/4 teaspoon sea salt, about 1 Tablespoon each (give or take) of freshly ground cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg. I grind them in my coffee grinder. I don't know how fresh the nutmeg was because I was able to press down on it with my knife and split it apart to get it in my grinder. 1 heaping spoonful of ground ginger. I would have used fresh, but wanted to use up my store bought stuff. :) 4 black peppercorns, and 4 cloves freshly ground.

1 also got the zest from 3 smaller grapefruits since I didn't have any oranges. I used about a teaspoon of almond extract since my homemade vanilla is still infusing. :)

I ran everything (but the bread) through my blender and poured it out evenly over the bread crumbs which I put into 4 separate casserole dishes. I then blended about 4 cups of fruit in my blender, an apple, 3 stalks of rhubarb, 3 grapefruits. I then poured about a cup over each casserole dish. I then sprinkled some raisins into each dish. I mixed everything thoroughly with a spoon.

I baked at 350 degrees for 45 minutes wrapped with aluminum foil and then took the foil off and let it go for another ten minutes or so til somewhat crisp.

Tried some with maple syrup - okay. Tried some with my niece Sarah's Cinnamon Syrup - awesome!!!

Sarah's Cinnamon Syrup (Simple syrup with cinnamon): 

• 2 cups of water
• 2 cups of raw cane sugar
• 5 cinnamon sticks, ground

Combine all ingredients in a saucepan. Simmer approximately 30 min­utes. Stirring occasionally to keep from burning. Keep stirring. Sarah: "It takes forever Auntie Katie". You're doing good Sarah, keep stirring. :)  Let cool.