 |
| The finished, plated product! Delish!! |
Do you ever scratch your head at the amount of “waste” that comes from all the bento sammies that are made? Well, I have a fantastic secret to share with you!! In my beginning days of bento making I hated the fact that there were all these pieces of bread that were getting essentially going to waste, so I started toasting them and making them into breadcrumbs, and then freezing them. Well, this was a great solution until I very quickly created a rather large bag of bread crumbs, and it sort of takes a while to use up bread crumbs in this house. So I started just throwing all my scraps into a big ziploc freezer bag and tossing them into the freezer (note: when making shaped sammies I cut them first and then put the fillings in so I don’t have filling on my sammie scraps in the freezer. This adds another step and can make the whole process a little longer, but it’s worth it in the end.) During my search of what to do with the scraps I found this recipe by Mamabelly for french toast casserole. I knew it would be a hit as my kids love french toast to begin with, and it looked pretty easy so I just had to try it. I amended the recipe a bit, and added a fresh berry compote to use up some of the berries I’ve got in my fridge that are close to going bad. So without further ado, here’s my recipe adapted from the Mamabelly one.
French Toast Casserole
6 cups of roughly chopped/cubed bread
4 large eggs, beaten
1 1/2 cups of milk
3 Tbsp sugar
3 Tbsp extra virgin coconut oil
(butter can be used in place)
2 Tbsp apple sauce
1/3 cup of pancake mix
3 Tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
 |
| Look at all those bread scraps! |
Instructions:
Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees.
Put 2 Tbsp of coconut oil in the botton of your casserole dish, melt if necessary (I ended up using a 9″ silicone round dish as my pyrex one in the photo was too large) Also, I decided to use extra virgin coconut oil as opposed to the regular stuff because I thought the coconut flavour of the extra virgin would be a nice compliment (and it was!)
In large bowl beat eggs and add in milk, 2 Tbsps apple sauce, and vanilla until combined. Add 1/3 cup of pancake mix (I used Bisquick)
Add bread chunks to bowl with egg mixture and lightly mix being careful to not mush it up too much. My bread chunks were frozen and I actually think it helped here as it assisted in the bread keeping it’s form after it got wet from the egg mixture. Fresh bread would work fine too though. Alternatively, you can toss the bread into the baking dish and pour the egg mixture evenly over top, but that just seemed like too much work! 🙂
Pour bread and egg mixture into baking dish.
Drizzle remaining 1 Tbsp coconut oil over the top of the french toast casserole.
In a small bowl, mix sugar and cinnamon, and sprinkle evenly over the top of the french toast casserole.
Bake at 400 degrees for about 15 – 20 minutes or until brown and crispy.
 |
| Mmmm, a finished masterpiece! |
I also made fresh strawberry and raspberry compote to top the french toast with. I very loosely used this recipe, but when I say loosely, I mean loosely! I used fresh berries instead of frozen, my measurements weren’t at all what were used here, and I added vanilla bean paste because it’s awesome! I think the only part I really followed was the cornstarch part! This recipe was what I used as guideline though.
This recipe, as I suspected was super SUPER good. It was really easy, tasty, and seriously seemed like something that would have been served in some fancy breakfast restaurant! This is easily adaptable to more or less people and would be great for Christmas morning or a group brunch. My kids loved it, I loved it, and even my non egg liking, french toast hating husband thought it was good! Mmmmmm! Will definitely be making this again! 🙂
Enjoy!
Are you following on social media? Find BentoMomma on:
Facebook // Twitter // Instagram // YouTube // Pinterest
Thank you for the mention and I love your fresh berry compote idea! Sounds delicious!
My pleasure!! I’m happy to give credit to an amazing inspiration such as yourself!! Thanks for all your great ideas!