Not Your Grandma's Bread Pudding

Mornin' All!

A couple years back I had a boatload of crusty rolls going stale and I hate throwing out food, so I went looking for a recipe I could try that would use up all this bread product.  I found one I liked and then I tweaked it.  Here it is...

Bread Pudding

8 cups of cubed crusty bread product (rolls, french bread, buns... anything with some heft to it)
1/2 cup golden raisins
4 cups apples* (peeled and diced)
1 3/4 cups brown sugar
1/3 cup maple syrup
2 1/3 c milk
1/4 cup margarine
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla
4 eggs (beaten)

Preheat oven to 350F.  Coat a 9x13" cake pan in cooking spray.  In a large bowl, combine bread, raisins, apples.  Set aside.  In a medium saucepan, combine brown sugar, syrup, milk, and margarine.  Heat slowly**, stirring constantly, until margarine is melted. Remove from heat and pour over bread mixture. Fold together until just combined.  Pour into prepared baking pan, smooshing it around until it's even.  In a small bowl, beat together eggs, vanilla, and cinnamon.  Pour egg mixture evenly over bread mixture in pan.  Bake 50-60 minutes, or until apples are fork tender.  Serve warm with vanilla ice cream or wait a day (it gets better when you wait) and microwave each serving for 10-20 seconds before adding ice cream.  Makes about 12 servings if you're generous with your servings.

*Any apples will do. Last time I had a mix of different apples in the house, so I used a few Gala, a couple Granny Smiths, and a couple Red Delicious.

**If you don't heat slowly, the milk will separate and look chunky.  Been there, done that. Tastes the same and you can't tell in the pudding itself, so don't sweat it.