Hot cross bun bread and butter pudding

Serves 6-8

INGREDIENTS * 600 ml semi-skimmed milk * 200 ml double cream * 400 ml single cream

A few drops of vanilla extract. It's worth spending a little extra on this, rather than reaching for that ancient bottle of vanilla essence gathering dust on your spice rack Lakeland stocks Nielsen Massey's extract, which is excellent * 4 eggs * 170 g caster sugar * 6 hot-cross buns, halved and buttered. I particularly like Heston from Waitrose Earl Grey and mandarin hot-cross buns they're gorgeously fruity and have the structural integrity necessary to withstand a deluge of custard

* Icing sugar, to serve

METHOD

1) Preheat your oven to 170°C/325°F/gas 3.

2) To make the custard, pour the milk and cream into a saucepan, and bring it only just up to the boil. Shake in the vanilla extract and take off the heat.

3) Break the eggs into a large bowl and whisk together with the sugar, then whisk in the vanilla-scented milk and cream.

4) Take the buttered hot-cross bun halves and dip them, one by one, into the mixture. Arrange them in an ovenproof dish so they're overlapping slightly.

5) Cover with the custard (you can pour it through a sieve if you like), and leave for 15-20 minutes. 6) Take a roasting tin slightly larger than your ovenproof dish, and half-fill it with hot (not boiling) water. Place the ovenproof dish into it and bake for about 45 minutes. Cooking the bread-and-butter pudding like this will stop the custard from overcooking and turning into a stodgy, omelette-esque mass. The finished dish should be crisp and golden-brown on top, but ever so slightly wobbly within.

7) Dust with icing sugar and serve with pouring cream, ice cream or more custard.

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