We recycle things around here. Some Christmas cards get framed, some shoe boxes store our spices. We recycle memories, getting two aunts confused in the same anecdote. When we are done with roast, it becomes soup. When the bread goes bad, it becomes dessert.

Last year I made a bread pudding for my mom, dedicated to her, really. Large chunks of sourdough and apples in a casserole dish. This year, I recycled once again. Those same thoughts, those same memories, that said love into another recipe. I used old stoneware mugs that were my grandmother's. I used bread my father had left on the counter, not bothering to throw it away while my mother worked doubles this week. I recycled a palate I know too well, chocolate and cherries and cream on top. We ate ours so quickly and asked if anyone else wanted seconds.

I'm moving to a farm at the end of the month. Five acres with someone I love and three dogs to keep us busy. I'm making up for lost time, baking a few of my parents' favorite dishes to say thank you for taking me in this year.

Black Forest Bread Pudding

Ingredients:

1 loaf of hearty bread, slightly stale, cubed
5 eggs
1 ¼ cup white sugar
6 cups buttermilk
2 tablespoon pure vanilla extract, divided
2 tablespoons Grand Marnier
¼ cup cocoa powder
1 teaspoon flaked sea salt
8 oz dark chocolate, roughly chopped (or substitute this with dark chocolate chips)
½ cup maraschino cherries, roughly chopped + more to top
8 oz Vermont Creamery mascarpone
¼ cup confectioner’s sugar
Chocolate sprinkles to top, if desired

Directions:

Put bread in a large bowl
In a separate bowl or measuring cup, whisk together eggs and sugar until light and combined
Continue whisking and add buttermilk, 1 ½ TB vanilla, Grand Marnier, cocoa powder, and salt. Whisk until ingredients are completely combined with no lumps
Now, slowly pour your wet ingredients over your bread, turning with a rubber spatula to get all of your bread moistened
Add chocolate and cherries and stir to combine
Cover loosely and allow to rest for 30 minutes
While your mixture is resting, preheat oven to 325*F and prepare your pan with a liberal amount of butter. I used stoneware mugs, but any pan can do (this recipe is very forgiving in this way)
When 30 minutes have expired, divide your mixture for your baking vessels. This recipe puffs up slightly, so I suggest filling until you reach a half inch from the top. If you are using mugs or smaller vessels, place on a cookie sheet for easy transportation
Bake for 35 minutes or until puffed and golden brown. Begin checking at the 30 minute mark for smaller pans/mugs and you may go well into 45 minutes for larger vessels
While dish is baking, whisk together mascarpone, confectioner’s sugar, and remaining vanilla until well combined. If you would like to cut the sweetness, add a pinch of salt (to your taste)
When bread pudding is done baking, allow to cool before assembling
To assemble: top with mascarpone mixture, a couple cherries, and some chocolate sprinkles. Enjoy immediately (while delicious, this recipe does not last longer than a two days)

This post was inspired by Vermont Creamery, who excel at making quality dairy products. In this recipe I used their mascarpone to top these bad boys, which is an Italian-style cream cheese (but is way more flavorful than cream cheese and is super versatile!). Check out their website, Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter for more information. Thank you, Vermont Creamery!

My mother moved out at 15, lived in an apartment by herself. Paid bills, went to school. She had my brother at 18. She married my dad at 25. She worked as a maid in an old woman’s house. She smoked cigarettes with long maroon-painted nails. She worked at a gas station after school. She got decent grades. She used to fold the laundry to pass the time. She didn’t have a TV until she was 20.

She was brought up differently than me, so she taught me all she learned while she was on her own. How to fold the towels. How to make the bed. How to clip coupons and buy in bulk. To never waste. How important work was. How things can be taken away. How fucking hard life is sometimes. How lucky I was. She taught me how to few on buttons and how to cut notches into my brother’s old belts so they could fit my waist. She taught me to never go to bed angry, but we all broke that rule. She taught me that any cut heals better with a kiss, any pain alleviated with her kiss.

Maybe that’s the reason I kissed so many boys when it all hurt so much to grow up.

I’ve always admired my mother. The way she was able to be so many different people in her life. There’s no word for a daughter who loses her mother—something in the periphery of widow and orphan. How she went from waif to housewife, from mother to enemy. How she went from working in warehouse freezers outside of Louisville, Kentucky to dipping chocolate truffles with an arthritic shoulder outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. How the nightgowns she wore used to brush the sand off the kitchen floor when we lived in Florida for a year. How I can still smell her hairspray and makeup when she would kiss me before she went to work at five in the morning—a mixture of rubbing alcohol and rose petals. She was the victim, the martyr, the saint. She was the Madonna of the Graveyard Shift. Now she sits and crochets blankets for her cats to sleep on in the addition she built for them on her farmhouse. Now my parents eat at chain restaurants at holidays because I’m not around much these days.

But when I was around, I wasn't always that great. I used to think she deserved her lot in life. I used to tell her that to her face. One time I told her she was my best friend and the worst kind of mother. Another time I told her I'd rather die than spend another year in her house. But now I can't think of anything else I want in life but to sit down at a sticky formica table with her at a buffet she swears makes the best bread pudding, just off a turnpike exit, just east of Pittsburgh.

And when the rain comes down in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, it pours for days at a time. It floods the creek, it floods the basement. The only silence you hear on those days is the stop and go of rainfall driving through the underpass. And I think my mother likes the rain that loud, that cold, that deafening. I think she likes it to drown out the empty house. I think she likes it to distract herself. And I don’t blame her, I do the same thing, too.

Apple Chai Bread Pudding

A warm, sticky comfort dessert that is elevated with apples, chai spices (inspired by A Brown Table's masala chai), and bread made with sweet potato puree. It'll keep you warm. Make bread a day or two ahead and cut up to stale.

Ingredients for the sweet potato bread (adapted from Local Milk's "No Time Bread":

2 medium-sized sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed
3 tablespoon coconut oil, melted
1 tablespoon maple syrup
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1 1/2 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 teaspoon of black pepper
1/2 teaspoon of salt
8 teaspoons active dry yeast
2 tablespoons sugar
3 cup water
2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon molasses or maple syrup
7 1/2 cups AP flour

Directions for the sweet potato bread:

Preheat oven to 350*F and prepare a half sheet pan with aluminum foil
Place sweet potatoes in a medium bowl
In a small measuring cup, whisk coconut oil, syrup, brown sugar, olive oil, pepper, and salt
Pour mixture over sweet potatoes and stir with a wooden spoon to coat
Pour onto prepared pan and spread out
Roast for 50 minutes or until browned, tender, and a little caramelized
(Can eat here as its own side dish or proceed on)
Let cool and puree in a food processor
While cooling, in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, add yeast, sugar, and water and allow to stand until foamy
Add salt, vinegar, and molasses/syrup, then turn mixer on low.
Begin to add flour, one cup at a time. When you have mixed in three cups of flour, add the sweet potato puree
Add remaining flour and switch to a dough hook
Mix with dough hook for 8 minutes or until dough is elastic and pulling away from the sides of the bowl
Dump onto a floured work surface and knead a couple times. Place in an oiled bowl, turning once, and lay a damp cloth on top of dough. Now, place a dry cloth on top of the damp cloth. Microwave for 25 seconds. Let rest for five minutes
Repeat process, but allow dough to rest for 15 minutes
While dough is resting, oil a dutch oven slightly and preheat oven to 450*F
When dough is finished resting, shape into a round and place in dough oven
Bake for 30 minutes, covered, then an additional 12 minutes uncovered, or until golden brown and crisp
Allow to cool and cube.
If using for bread pudding, do this a couple days ahead to stale.

Ingredients for Bread Pudding:

One loaf of sweet potato bread (above), cubed and stale
3 cup whole milk (or cream if you're extra bad)
2-inch piece of ginger, peeled and sliced
12 green cardamom pods, crushed
1 cinnamon stick
10-15 peppercorns, crushed
10-12 whole cloves, crushed
4 tablespoons loose leaf black tea (I used a pecan blend my mom made me)
1 1/2 teaspoon allspice
6 egg yolks
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon orange zest
2 tablespoon orange juice
2 tablespoon vanilla
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
2 apples, cored and chopped

Directions for Bread Pudding:

Place bread cubes in a large mixing bowl
In a small sauce pan, begin heating milk on medium heat
While milk is heating, place all spices (excluding the cinnamon stick and ginger) into a mortar and grind, breaking up cloves, pods, and peppercorns
Place spices, ginger, tea, and cinnamon stick into milk and allow to simmer for 8-12 minutes, keep the heat low but allow for small bubbles to appear on the edge of the milk
Turn heat off and cover. Allow to cool fully with the infused spices
While mixture is cooling, separate eggs (reserve whites) and add sugar, whisking to combine until a pale yellow. Add zest, orange juice, salt, and vanilla
Also prepare apples and preheat oven to
When milk mixture is cool, pour through a fine mesh strainer into yolk and sugar and whisk together
Add apples to bread in mixing pour and pour milk-yolk mixture over top. Allow to sit for a few minutes to absorb liquid
Butter your dish heavily and pour contents of mixing bowl into dish
Bake for 30-45 minutes, checking for doneness at the 30 minute mark, until sides are slightly crisp and center is gooey
Eat within two days (especially warm!)