Recipe Tuesday

Every few months I have the privilege of making a meal for our church worship team.  I can do a Saturday night dinner or a Sunday morning breakfast.  Normally, I choose Sunday mornings simply because I feel like the options are better (cooking creatively for 25 people--without going broke--is no easy task!).  However, the past few months I feel like I've taken the same thing every time, and I needed some creative inspiration.  This past Sunday it was my turn again, and I decided to be brave and try a new recipe.  Thankfully, it was a huge success! And, since we are heading into that time of year where families come together for special breakfasts and brunches or we attend gatherings that require a yummy dish to pass, I thought you might enjoy the recipe too.

It's not rocket science, for sure, so don't be too impressed.  I found the recipe easily on allrecipes.com and thought it sounded good.  I will admit that I personally do not care for any sort of "overnight french toast" or breakfast casserole that contains bread.  Just can't get past the sogginess factor.  So, I was a little nervous to try this, especially after so many reviews mentioned the dish was soggy and mushy.  But my main goal with this dish was to find something I could make the night before and just finish up early Sunday morning, and this fit the bill.

After reading many of the reviews, I did end up making some pretty drastic changes to the original recipe.  If you want to check it out in its original form, go here.  The version below contains my changes, which, from what I heard, were good changes!  (I will also sheepishly admit that I didn't actually taste even one bite!)

Enjoy!!  Oh--as you will soon see, this is definitely NOT low cal or low fat!  But isn't that what makes it so good??


Baked French Toast

1 loaf French bread, cut diagonally in 1 inch slices (I used the hardest bread I could find to help combat the "sogginess".)
6 eggs
2 cups half-and-half cream
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Topping

3/4 cup butter
1 1/3 cups brown sugar
3 tablespoons light corn syrup

Butter a 9x13* inch baking dish. Arrange the slices of bread in the bottom. In a large bowl, beat together eggs, cream, vanilla and cinnamon.  Pour over bread slices.  Cover and refrigerate overnight. 

The next morning, preheat oven to 350 degrees.  While oven is preheating, remove dish from refrigerator and turn over each slice of bread.  Cover and bake for 20 minutes.  While baking, combine butter, brown sugar, and corn syrup in a medium saucepan and heat until bubbling.  After 20 minutes, remove pan from over and pour topping over bread.  Bake, uncovered, for another 20 minutes.**

* My pan overflowed and made a huge mess in my oven, not to mention filled the kitchen with smoke.  If you have a slightly larger casserole pan, that might be a good choice! 
** The dish was still pretty "soggy" when I took it out of the oven, but the bread quickly absorbed the excess liquid and the topping was sort of candied on the top. 
*** You can also add whipped topping, fruit, or nuts, if desired.