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Did you get a fruitcake in the mail? I haven’t seen a fruitcake in years, but I did recently binge-watch the entire first season of The Holiday Baking Championship on Food Network. When they were handed fruitcakes as a challenge the effervescent rockabilly chef Erin Campbell did something amazing: She made what she called a “junkyard brownie,” drying the cake in the oven, then pulverizing it in the food processor and eventually turning it into a brownie. I thought that was genius. You can follow her recipe here. It looks fantastic, with a pool of spiced orange liqueur sauce.
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As far as I can remember, all of the other contestants did something like a bread pudding, which is also genius. I would cube the fruitcake and then dilute it by using some other, blander bread, too. Day-old croissants are the best, of course.
Also: panetonne! Holy cow, right? Check out this recipe for panetonne bread pudding from Victoria Jordan Rodriguez at the James Beard Foundation. I'll ruin it for you: Just hack up a panetonne and throw a custard over it. YUM.
Got leftover eggnog in the fridge? You know what's awesome: eggnog ice cream. If you have real (not soy, not almond milk, not fat-free) eggnog you can just DUMP IT IN THE ICE CREAM MAKER and it comes out as ice cream! Because it's already custard, duh. Do this. And then plop a scoop on some gingerbread, something dark and rich and wild, like this molasses gingerbread cake.
Speaking of holiday do-overs, I'm kind of freaking out over these corn flake-candy cane cookies from Momofuku Milk Bar. Is that amazing or what?
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Santa Fe Reporter