Pumpkin Bread Pudding With Caramel Sauce

Ingredients

• 1 -1 1/4 lb pumpkin
• 3 1/4 cups milk
• 1 1/2 cups dairy eggnog
• 5 eggs, beaten
• 3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
• 1/3 cup golden raisin
• 8 -10 ounces french bread, cut into 1-inch cubes(8 cups)
• 10 pieces vanilla caramels
• 1/2 cup whipping cream
• 1/4 teaspoon anise seed
• 1/4 teaspoon rum flavoring

Recipe

• 1 preheat oven to 350*.cut pumpkin into quarters; remove seeds.discard seeds or save for roasting.place pumpkin, cut side down, on a lightly greased baking pan.bake, uncovered, for 30 minutes or until almost tender.remove peel; cut baked pumpkin into 3/4 inch pieces.
• 2 in a large mixing bowl stir together milk, eggnog, eggs, sugar, vanilla and pumpkin pie spice.sprinkle raisins on bottom of an ungreased 3 qt. rectangular baking dish.spread bread over raisins.pour egg mixture evenly over bread.
• 3 carefully stir in cubed pumpkin.
• 4 bake for 50 minutes or until the pudding is puffy and a knife inserted near the center comes out clean.
• 5 cool pudding slightly (pudding will fall in center). drizzle with warm caramel sauce. makes 12 servings.
• 6 warm caramel sauce: in a heavy saucepan melt caramel squares with whipping cream over low heat, stirring constantly until smooth.
• 7 stir in anise seed and rum flavoring, if desired.
• 8 cool slightly before serving recipes from better homes and gardens magazine