White Chocolate Banana Bread Pudding Recipe

Earlier this year when our family was vacationing we visited the Downtown Disney area in Florida. We were overwhelmed with dinner choices and made the mistake of NOT making a reservation. I had high hopes of eating at the Rainforest Cafe until we found out the wait time was over 2 hours. We had two very hungry toddlers with us and decided to give in to my husbands idea of eating at the House of Blues where the wait time was only 15 minutes. As it turns out, my dear husband made a good choice. The place was lively, fun and the dessert was out of this world. Ever since I first ate their White Chocolate Banana Bread Pudding I have been craving it.

After months of putting it off and ignoring the "must make this now" craving I got bored enough to experiment with some ingredients, pieced together different online recipes and came up with a white chocolate banana bread pudding that rivals the House of Blues dessert. I think the key to getting the richness I desired was trading out that plain old French board for a heavy egg bread. I haven't seen a store locally that makes one so I just made it myself which is relatively easy, especially if you have a bread machine.

Ingredients:

• 4-5 cups cubed and dried Challah
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 2 cups whole milk
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 6 ounces white chocolate chips
• 4 egg yolks
• 1 egg
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 bananas

sauce

• ¾ cup heavy cream
• 6 ounces white chocolate chips

Instructions:

1. In a medium saucepan heat sugar, milk and cream over medium high heat until it begins to simmer, stirring frequently.
2. Immediately remove from heat and stir in white chocolate chips until melted. Set aside to cool.
3. In a small bowl, whisk eggs until smooth. Add ½ cup of the warm milk mixture to the eggs whisking constantly until combined.
4. Add the egg mixture to the milk saucepan, stirring constantly until combined.
5. Add the vanilla and stir.
6. Grease an 8 x 8 baking dish with butter or non-stick cooking spary and add the bread cubes. Toss with sliced bananas.
7. Heat oven to 350 degrees F.
8. Pour the warm egg mixture over the bread cubes and set aside for 30 minutes to absorb the liquid.
9. Bake for 45 minutes, just until the bread pudding has set.
10. For the sauce, heat the cream over medium-high heat until it begins to simmer and remove from heat. Stir in white chocolate chips.