pear brioche bread pudding

This is one of the most elegant looking desserts I have ever seen. Unfortunately, the taste is utter disappointment. Ideally, bread pudding should be rich, eggy and tender; a magical process through which stale bread is transformed into one of the most comforting of desserts. This bread pudding, however, failed on all counts. It may have been the technique: the recipe called for putting the bread and pears into the muffin papers and then pouring the custard over. This meant that the bread did not get the good soaking that it should have. It could have also have been the composition of the dessert itself. While the bread and pears look striking stacked up against one another, this stacking prevented them from melding together as a good bread pudding should. Eating this pudding was like taking bites of two separate desserts: baked pears, and crusty/semi-soft brioche, neither of which was very good. FYI- this recipe comes from Little Cafe Cakes by Julie LeClerc.