Bitter and Blanc on Carnival Breeze

Decadent and delicious, Carnival’s rich warm Bitter & Blanc pudding served with vanilla sauce makes a fine end to a meal, whether served on board the cruise ship or at home.  It has a lot of steps to making it, but the results make it worthwhile.  For a quick and easy yet tasty dessert, try the chocolate melting cake.

fresh baked bitter & Blanc, before adding the vanilla sauce

Finding Brioche bread may not be as easy as a trip to the local supermarket.  I could not find any at the ordinary grocery stores near my house.  I’m guessing upscale grocery stores or bakeries, which I don’t live near, might be more likely to carry it.  Since I couldn’t find any, I looked online for recipes and made my own.  I used a recipe from a site called Group Recipes, but other sites offered recipes as well.

Brioche Bread

fresh baked brioche bread

• 1/2 cup whole milk
• 2 large eggs
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 package active dry yeast (= 2 1/2 teaspoons)

Directions

Bread machine recipe:

• Add all ingredients in order to your bread machine. Set on the dough cycle. When cycle is done (usually 1 1/2 hours for most bread machines) proceed to cooling rack instructions.

By Hand Recipe:

• Heat the milk in a small saucepan over low heat until it’s just warm (110-115F) Remove pan from heat and pour milk into a small bowl. Stir in the yeast and 1 cup of the flour. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let rest for 10 min.
• Combine the butter, sugar, salt and eggs in a mixer bowl with a paddle attachment (or food processor). Add the remaining 1 1/2 cups flour and process until smooth. Add the yeast mixture and process again until smooth. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead 5 minutes, until smooth and elastic.
• Shape the dough into a loaf and place into 8 1/2 or 9 inch non-stick loaf pan. Cover the pan with a clean dish towel and allow rising for about an hour.
• Preheat the oven to 375F. Using a sharp knife, score the loaf length wise with a sharp knife. The score the loaf 3 times at equal intervals across. This makes a professional looking loaf and helps it bake evenly.
• Bake for 30-40 minutes, or until golden. Remove from pan and place the loaf on its side on a cooling rack. Alternate side after 5 minutes (this prevents the loaf from compressing)

Once you have some Brioche bread, whether baked or bought, you can make the Bitter & Blanc pudding.  This recipe makes 4- 5 servings of the Bitter & Blanc.  It doesn’t take the whole loaf, but the leftover bread makes great French toast.

GANACHE

3 oz Dark Chocolate

1/4 cup Heavy Cream

PUDDING

3 cups Brioche Bread, crusts removed and cut into cubes

3 egg yolks

2 Tablespoons sugar

1/3 cup heavy cream

4 oz white chocolate

3 Tablespoons butter

MERINGUE

1 egg white

1 1/2 Tablespoons sugar

VANILLA SAUCE

top the bitter & blanc with vanilla sauce

2/3 cup whole milk

2 Tablespoons sugar

1/2 tablespoon cornstarch

2 egg yolks

1 teaspoon vanilla

DIRECTIONS

Heat oven to 325 degrees farenheit. Grease  5 individual souffle cups or 2/3 cup pyrex bowls with butter and sprinkle lightly with sugar.

Ganache: break dark chocolate into squares in small bowl.  Heat heavy cream to simmer in small saucepan.  Pour simmering cream over chocolate.  Stir until chocolate melts. Let cool slightly, then spoon into prepared cups.

Pudding: Put bread cubes in mixing bowl.  Pour cream over bread and let soak.  Melt white chocolate and butter in small saucepan over low heat, stirring frequently. Let cool slightly.  In mixing bowl, cream sugar with egg yolks.  Add white chocolate mixture slowly to egg mixture, beating constantly on slow speed to prevent egg from cooking on contact with warm white chocolate mixture.  Stir in the cream-soaked bread by hand.

Meringue: Beat egg white with sugar until white and fluffy and stiff enough to form peaks.  Fold into bread mixture.  Spoon into bowls over ganache.

Bake at 325 degrees farenheit for 30-45 minutes until pudding sets and tops brown.  When pudding looks nearly done, start cooking vanilla sauce.

Vanilla Sauce: Boil milk and sugar in small saucepan.  In small bowl, cream egg yolks with cornstarch.  Whisk the hot milk into the bowl a little at a time, whisking while pouring to prevent scrambling the eggs.  Add vanilla and pour back into saucepan.  Cook on low heat stirring constantly with whisk until desired thickness is reached.  Remove from heat.

Bitter & Blanc on Carnival Liberty.  Sorry about the blurry photo.  I didn’t get any good ones.

Poke holes in center of pudding and pour vanilla sauce into and over top of warm pudding before serving.

Croutons

Carnival serves theirs topped with some croutons that look like they are probably made of toasted, sugared brioche bread.  It didn’t look as fancy without them, but tasted quite good.  Their recipe didn’t include their croutons, but I made some one day by cutting the bread into cubes, rolling the cubes in sugar, and then baking them at 250 degrees for about 25 minutes and flipping once to dry out the bread.  Then broil them just until lightly toasted, again flipping once.  This may not be how they make their croutons, but it works fine if you want some.

Easier Recipe

 If this recipe seems too difficult, try my Chocolate Chip Bread Pudding recipe, which tastes similar to the Bitter & Blanc and is a whole lot easier to make.

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2012