Easiest Noodle Kugel

For those of you who may not know what noodle kugel is, it's a dish traditionally served at Jewish holidays (at least in my family!).  It's basically a casserole made with a custard base and egg noodles, and is really yummy - it's almost like sweet mac & cheese with sour cream instead of cheese, and corn flakes on top instead of breadcrumbs :).  Not the most healthy dish - refined pasta loaded with butter, sour cream, and sugar, but hey, we're still talking about the holidays here!  But if it can't be a healthy side dish, can't it at least be easy?  Most noodle kugel recipes require cooking the pasta as a separate step (and creating another pot to clean), but I found one years ago that just requires putting uncooked pasta right in the baking dish.  Perfect. 

The resulting dish is soft, a little sweet, creamy, and delicious.  Everyone out there seems to have an idea of what kugel should be like - some will say there has to be raisins, or pineapple, or it should have cottage cheese, cinnamon, etc, but I really like this very simple recipe.  That being said, feel free to experiment - I think there's lots of room for playing here!

Btw, apologies for no picture on this post...forgot to take them while it was still fresh and didn't want to discourage anyone by taking pictures after it was already cold!  I promise to update when I make this again next year :)

Easiest Noodle Kugel
adapted from Epicurious

8 ounces wide egg noodles (feel free to try with whole wheat egg noodles if you can find them - I looked but didn't see any!)
1 cup raisins (optional)
5 large eggs
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted, cooled
1/3 cup sugar (if you like a really sweet kugel you might want to increase this amount, but I like the lightly sweet version)
4 cups whole milk (or lowfat...I used half whole and half 1% with good results)
1 teaspoon vanilla

3 cups cornflakes, coarsely crushed (I used Nature's Path organic)
1/4 cup (packed) dark brown sugar

Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a 13 x 9 x 2-inch glass baking dish.

Spread uncooked noodles over bottom of prepared dish and sprinkle with raisins, if using. Whisk together eggs, sour cream, butter, sugar, milk, and vanilla in large bowl until smooth. Pour mixture over noodles and let kugel stand 5 minutes.

Mix cornflakes and brown sugar in bowl and sprinkle evenly over kugel.

Bake kugel until set in center, about 1 hour. Cut into squares. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Serves 12