pumpkin bread pudding

Pumpkin is one of my favorite things about fall.  It is a flavor I look forward to every year.  I picked up a sugar pumpkin at the store, not really knowing what I wanted to do with it.  Normally I would roast it and leave it at that, but I decided to take roasted pumpkin and incorporate it into a bread pudding.

To begin I cut the pumpkin into smaller pieces to roast in the oven. I placed the pumpkin on a cookie sheet and covered with melted butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, and ginger paste.  I set this to roast in the oven until the pumpkin fell apart easily with a fork.

I removed the skin from the pumpkin and I placed the cooked pieces in a blender with eggs, half and half, sugar and cinnamon.  I blended this combination until smooth and set aside while I cut my bread.  I used a day old country style sourdough bread.  Any day old crusty bread works to soak up all the liquid from the pumpkin mixture.  I cut the bread into large cubes and placed them in a deep pan.  I covered the bread with the pumpkin mixture and let this soak in for 10 minutes.

The pudding was browned on the top and the inside of the pudding was tender, but not mushy.

The flavor of pumpkin, cinnamon, and ginger really stood out making this a perfect fall dessert.