Traditional Viennese Plum Bread Pudding with Meringue Topping

Preheat the oven to 170 °C top/bottom heat. Thoroughly grease an ovenproof baking dish with approx. 20 g of softened butter. Wash, halve, pit, and slice the plums into wedges. In a bowl, mix the plum pieces with 30 g of granulated sugar and the ground cinnamon.

Cut the stale bread rolls (or white bread) into approx. 1 cm thick slices. Carefully separate the eggs into yolks and whites. Set the egg whites aside. In a bowl, whisk together the whole milk, 3 egg yolks, vanilla sugar, and 30 g of granulated sugar. Melt the remaining 30 g of butter and stir it into the milk mixture.

Briefly dip half of the bread slices into the milk mixture and arrange them closely to cover the bottom of the prepared baking dish. Distribute the marinated plums evenly over the bread. Dip the remaining bread slices into the milk as well and arrange them as the top layer over the plums. Pour any remaining milk mixture evenly over the top.