Bread and Butter Pudding

I love bread and butter pudding. Served warm with custard, it's like a little slice of heaven... and it uses up your stale bread!

Ingredients:
Pudding:
2/9 cup Raisins
1/12 cup Rum ; optional
4 ounces Day-old white bread ; cut 1/2" cubes
14 grams Unsalted butter ; softened
1 cups Milk
1 teaspoon Vanilla extract
1/6 cup Granulated sugar
1 large Eggs
1 large Egg yolks
Custard for serving:
1 large egg yolks
1 tablespoons sugar ; scant
1/3 cups whole milk
1/5 teaspoon Vanilla extract

Instructions:
In a small bowl, macerate raisins in rum 30 minutes. Butter bread.

Drain the raisins. Lightly butter a 2-quart baking dish. Spread the bread evenly in the baking dish and sprinkle the raisins on top.

Preheat oven to 200°C.

In a heavy saucepan bring milk to a bare simmer over moderate heat with vanilla bean and granulated sugar and remove pan from heat. Scrape seeds from vanilla bean with a knife into milk, reserving pod for another use, and whisk to break up seeds.

In a large heatproof bowl whisk together whole eggs and yolks and add hot milk in a slow stream, whisking. Stir in vanilla.

Ladle custard evenly over bread (make sure the custard covers the bread) and set dish in a larger baking pan. Add enough hot water to pan to reach halfway up side of dish and bake pudding in middle of oven 25 to 30 minutes, or until puffed and set.

Remove dish from water bath and cool pudding to warm or room temperature.

Custard for serving:
Whisk egg yolks and sugar in medium bowl until well blended, about 2 minutes. Bring milk to boil in heavy medium saucepan (or double boiler); gradually whisk into yolk mixture.

Return custard to saucepan and stir over medium heat until custard thickens and reaches 160°F and leaves path on back of spoon when finger is drawn across, about 4-15 minutes (do not boil). Remove from heat immediately.

Cool quickly. Set pan in larger pan of ice water; stir occasionally and gently for a few minutes to hasten cooling. Stir in vanilla. Serve warm, or transfer to bowl and press piece of plastic wrap onto surface of sauce to prevent a "skin" from forming and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled, at least 1 hour. (Can be prepared 1 day ahead. Keep refrigerated.)