Buns and Butter Pudding

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter weekend... mine was filled with loads of food and a company of lovely friends, so I really couldn't ask for a better one. I ditched lamb for our Easter dinner this year, and instead I cooked slow-roast pork belly and non of my friends complained. We all love pork belly. And with pork belly and crunchy cracklings, I have to have braised red cabbage with apple, bacon and balsamic vinegar.

Phil from As Strong As Soup suggested to add the pomegranate molasses that I have that needs using to braised red cabbage. And I am glad I listened to him. The pomegranate molasses along with the balsamic vinegar give a lovely zinc to the braised red cabbage; and I always think it's nice to have something acidic to balance the richness of the pork belly. So, thank you Phil!

There were also hasselback potatoes with rosemary and sprouts cooked in Marsala and chorizo, but let's focus on the pudding. The divine inspiration for this (hot cross) buns and butter pudding comes from Jamie Oliver, but I altered the recipe, not too much, to my liking. Wonderful bakers out there I'm sure baked their own hot cross buns around this time, I took a shortcut and bought mine from M&S. I hope you're not too disappointed.

Anyway, some of the changes I made are, I didn't use orange zest, but instead, I slathered the hot cross buns halves in soft butter and marmalade. Then, to the custard I added a pinch of cinnamon and a generous splosh of brandy... oh yeah! How bad can that be? It feels so Christmassy and I do love that time of year. And because I wanted a bit of crunch, I topped the bread pudding with toasted flaked almonds halfway through baking time.

This is one seriously delicious bread pudding. Serve warm with more of the custard....

Buns and Butter Pudding
Recipe by Jamie Oliver
For list of ingredients and instructions, click here.