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French Toast

French Toast

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, which I picked up from The Silver Palate Cookbook, is to add some orange zest, and a bit of Triple Sec orange liqueur to the batter for extra zing.

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French Toast Recipe

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

Optional

  • 2 teaspoons freshly grated orange zest
  • 1/4 cup Triple Sec
  • Fresh berries

Method

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

2 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.

3 Serve hot with butter, maple syrup, and if available, fresh berries.

Serves 4.

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6 Comments

Elise, I made this recipe this morning. My son loved it (he loves anything orange).

Posted by: Sandra on February 24, 2005 11:30 AM

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!

Posted by: natasa on November 3, 2005 9:12 AM

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.

A lot of bread won't go stale or slightly dry within a day if kept in a bag. So I slice it (if it isn't already sliced) and then leave it out for a while to dry. However, not bone dry, or it takes too long to absorb the batter.

Posted by: Doug Stewart on December 26, 2006 3:58 PM

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.

Posted by: Vicki on November 25, 2008 7:19 PM

I've never tried with orange zest. Sounds delicious, though.

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.

Posted by: Rachel on February 3, 2009 1:35 PM

The French name for this dish is "pain perdue" which literally means "lost bread". It was originally a way of using up stale bread that was going to be thrown away, so that's why you have to use stale bread. Gotta love French cuisine.

Posted by: Milligan on June 24, 2009 6:20 PM

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