French Toast, Instant

By Snowy0wl

Ingredients

• 4 eggs
• 2/3 cup milk
• 2 teaspoons of cinnamon
• 8 thick slices of 2-day-old bread, better if slightly stale
• Butter
• Maple syrup
• 2 teaspoons freshly grated orange zest
• 1/4 cup Triple Sec
• Fresh berries

Details

Servings 4
Preparation time 5mins
Cooking time 20mins
Adapted from simplyrecipes.com

Preparation

Step 1

Is there nothing better than French toast for Sunday breakfast? Thick slices of bread, soaked in a mixture of beaten eggs with milk and cinnamon, toasted in a frying pan, and served with butter and maple syrup, this has to be one of our favorite breakfast dishes. It works best with several day old French or Italian loaf bread, thickly sliced. Fresh bread, or bread that has been sliced too thin tends to get mushy and fall apart when soaked in the egg milk mixture. Many people serve with powdered sugar; I believe there is enough sugar in the maple syrup, so I don’t add more. One of my favorite variations, the idea for which I picked up from

20 some odd years ago, is to add some orange zest, and a bit of Triple Sec orange liqueur to the batter for extra zing.

Beat eggs, milk, and cinnamon together. If using, add orange zest and/or Triple Sec. Whisk until well blended. Pour into a shallow bowl.

Dip each slice of bread into the egg mixture, allowing bread to soak up some of the mixture. Melt some butter (or use vegetable oil) over a large skillet on medium high heat. Add as many slices of bread onto the skillet as will fit at a time. Fry until brown on both sides, flipping the bread when necessary.

It is way better when milk is not mixed with eggs, but the bread slices are firstly dipped into milk and then in the eggs mixture. It’s crispy and simply wonderfull!

I absolutely agree that the recipe is better if the bread is slightly stale. Or, more accurately, if is is somewhat dried out. It absorbs the batter much better that way. When I make dumplings, I also use stale bread for that as well.

Instead of day old bread I use Texas toast. It is much thicker and absorbs the batter in pretty much the same way as day old bread. My recipe is pretty plain Jane. All I mix together is egg, milk and vanilla.

The way I’ve always eaten it here in South Louisiana is just dipping the bread in a mixture of eggs, milk, and vanilla extract or vanilla bean, and topping with powdered sugar and/or syrup after cooked. I think we are just suckers for any beignet-like breakfast food around here, though! haha.

French Toast is one of my all time favorite comfort foods! It’s what my mom always used to make for me on Saturday mornings. I love to prepare it using challah. I feel like whipping some up right now!

You’re absolutely right — orange zest makes french toast delicious. I love to use challah bread, a sweet bread common in Jewish culture.

Mmmmmm…. a wonderful breakfast, about the only good reason I have for pure maple syrup, and with bacon or sausage on the side. I’ve never known to try a crustier or staler bread, which would explain why mine was always mushy in the center. I’ve got to try that, along with the vanilla idea. I’ve not done the icing sugar, but I guess that would turn it into more of a dessert idea, with a fruit compote beside it. Does anyone have any ideas of how to make “stuffed french toast”?

I think my recipe for french toast came from misreading a recipe when I was younger. It’s completely different, but it makes the best french toast ever. Soak disks of baguette in a mixture of milk, sugar, vanilla and ground nutmeg, then coat in whisked egg before frying. They end up with a texture something like a toasted marshmallow. Hmm. Gotta go to the shops for bread…

Karen, Re stuffed French Toast. You just use a very thick slice of bread and cut a pocket in one side. Insert your filling – I like cream cheese and berries – and then continue with the dipping and cooking. This will make an awesome desert sprinkled with Icing Sugar – Powdered Sugar.

Around the holidays I’ll switch out the milk for eggnog and add a bit of fresh grated nutmeg. Even store bought eggnog gives a good twist on french toast.

My Dad always made the french toast. His recipe was similar but the method was a bit different. He worked the night shift and would pick up fresh sourdough in San Francisco on the way home. At the end of the week, there were always some stale ends in the bread box. He’d soak them in the egg mixture, then cook in the waffle iron. It would puff up like a souffle and was wonderful.

My wife (like most people) would love this marvelously unpretentious breakfast dish even with the added cinnamon and maple syrup.

No milk unless you use heavy cream. Better with just eggs. My grandson told me when he was about 6 years old to cook the french toast in a waffle iron. He said it was better like that & you had holes for the syrup. I don’t use syrup but lots of butter & then powdered sugar. I have made it that way since, he is now 34 years old. My husband liked the idea of holes for the syrup,he also added powdered sugar & sometimes cinnamon sugar.

An easier way to make stuffed French toast: Take two slices of bread, spread about 2 T of cream cheese on one and sprinkle with blueberries, make a sandwich, dip as usual and fry.

What we do is a savoury version of it by adding salt and red chilli powder and some grated cheese. Delicious.

French toast made with thickly sliced pannetone goes well with the added orange zest.

If you want a special treat, try making your egg mixture with ice cream. Rum Raisin is a favorite. Allow to melt, then whisk in 1 or 2 eggs and 1t vanilla. Dip some thick slices of Challah or Cinnamon bread. Melt some butter (about 1T) in a heavy skillet. Brown on medium heat. Top with berries and dust with powdered sugar. YUMM.

My brother makes great french toast. Not sure about his egg / milk mix but what he does do is top them with butter, fresh lemon juice and powdered sugar (same as we do on dutch babies). Occasionally he will take the extra step and push blueberries into the toast after it’s soaked, just after he puts them in the pan. Fabulous.

I’ve actually read lots of tips in cookbooks on how to make it less mushy… one of the books I have on hand recommends using the oven on a very low setting to dry out the bread a little before soaking it in the egg mixture. Another that I have, and the recipe I use most often (I haven’t had a chance to try this one yet, but you may be assured I am anxious to give it a try!), calls for adding a small amount of flour to the egg mixture, a tip I found extremely interesting.

Adding few teaspoons of ginger in addition to the cinnamon makes it much tastier! As usual, the more spices, the better!

I TRY to make mine a little lower in fat and cholesterol – I just use the egg whites, some nonfat evaporated milk (for a little richness, instead of just plain milk), vanilla, and some freshly grated nutmeg! I use the pan spray, instead of the butter that I love so much….. When someone really close to you has a stroke, it kind of makes you rethink your diet a little……But I will definitely have to try the orange idea – sounds yummy.

I love French toast – thanks for this recipe! Sometimes I add orange oil (bought it at Williams-Sonoma) to French toast and pancake batters. I like how it adds orange flavor without the textural bits of actual zest (it depends, though – sometimes I like the surprise of biting down on a wee bit of zest).

I too use challah bread, and I don’t let any bread get too stale because I’m a sucker for soft, gooey bread … anywhere, anytime. I know it’s not the “right way” to make French toast, but it works for me!

I like to add a little bit of vanilla to the egg mixture. Yum

I’m with those of you who SOAK your bread in the egg/milk mixture rather than just dip it. I soak until there is no liquid left (If you’ve ever seen Alton Brown’s recipe from HGTV — he soaks his overnight in the fridge.)

I want the french toast to be moist on the inside and taste of the egg mixture all the way through. I add a little orange juice, vanilla extract and nutmeg before SOAKING.

Ok….omg, yummmmm….I have never tried using challah bread, but I LOVE challah bread, so I have to try it this way next time! And I don’t put the cinnamon in the mixture, because some of us don’t like cinnamon….I just sprinkle it on the slices for people who want it :-)

Jessica W: For crispy French toast, add a large pinch of cornflour/cornstarch to the batter. (That’s what’s done in Asia, anyway, for a crispy coating.) Cornflour works better than regular flour.

I didn’t know there was such a thing as a “recipe” for french toast, much less, different ways to make it, until I stopped being a little kid! My mom always, always, always just used Texas Toast to make our french toast. And there was always cinnamon and vanilla in it. It was never mushy, and always delicious :)

Maybe you´ll think me crazy, but actually I make mine a sandwich. Use your favorite type of ham and cheese in between 2 or more french toasts. And if you are daring enough try pouring some honey on top of that. Enjoy!

My mother makes a delicious cinnamon swirl bread and for years (maybe until I went to college?) I thought that was the only kind of bread that could be used for French Toast. It was always a special treat when she made the cinnamon bread and then a double special treat when she made it into French Toast!

I made my first ever batch of french toast using this recipe, but not mixing the milk with the eggs and cinnamon. I served it up to my grandmother (who is a food guru) and my brother, and they absolutely loved it!

We also tried slathering it a bit with the toffee used for Banoffee Pie (since my grandma likes to keep them in stock in our fridge), and it was great. :) Will try adding vanilla to the egg mixture in the future.

This looks delicious. My mother makes french toast using cinnamon raisin bread and also Challah bread. But, I will definitely tell her about this recipe.

I always add a little Cardamom to my egg mixture

I like to put cream cheese in between the bread pinch the edges then use your favorite egg mixture

When we ran a B&B some years ago we used to make french toast with almost the same recipe. One final step however was after dipping the bread in the egg/milk mixture we dipped both sides in crushed cornflakes. The end result was always delicious and slightly crunchy.

Corn flakes is a great way to make a crunchy crust on the French toast. We have a

I loved this recipe! It was so yummy :) I added pecans to the maple syrup….so if you love nuts I would try it because it was delicious!

This recipe looks pretty good, but please consider the following additions and changes:

Add also to the egg mixture: a dash of nutmeg and 1/2 tsp vanilla. I also like to use 2 day old french bread, cut on the diagonal.

I just found this recipe this morning while “googling” french toast. It was phenomenal! I had just bought some triple sec yesterday for some Sangria I was making. That yummy addition took it over the top! You could definitely taste the orange and the kids loved them. This recipe will go directly into my recipe book, and I will be tossing out my old one! Thanks for sharing.

Perfect. Thank you! I had never made French Toast before, oddly enough, so I wasn’t sure about egg-to-milk ratio. This was great. I just used a loaf of homemade whole wheat bread that was going stale, and it soaked up the liquid really well. I cooked the toast on my big electric griddle at 350, until it was nicely browned on both sides.

This morning was my wife’s birthday and I wanted to cook breakfast for her. I saw your recipe and thought I’d try it. I sliced Hawaiian sweet bread thickly and let it sit out last night on the counter. This morning it was just right to dip in the egg mixture that I added Grand Marnier and orange zest to.

While the bread was soaking all the mixture up, I pre-heated the waffle iron then put the slices onto the iron and cooked for 4 minutes and served with warmed syrup, butter and fresh blueberries. Magnifique!