Recipe - Overnight French Toast

We are hosting some of our best friends this weekend. They are getting married later this year and are visiting for a bridal shower thrown by my MIL and for some boy time at a couple baseball games. When hosting guests I always want to make a good breakfast. My pinterest and recipe books are filled with tons of amazing breakfast recipes but I often go back to an old standard because it is just. so.good.

This has become a very special recipe in our family and is something I just sort of came up with when we had some stale bread. This recipe is perfect for when you need something with very little day-of prep time. You can make this a day ahead and just toss it in the oven. The cook time is an hour and a half but well worth it and quite doable if you are already up prepping for guests or like me tending to your child who has decided 5am is a reasonable hour to start the day.

I hope you and your guests enjoy this old faithful recipe as much as we do!!

To make this glorious recipe all you have to do is tear up a loaf of bread (or slice in to 1 inch squares) about 24 hours before you want to serve this dish. I prefer challah because it dries out nicely and is slightly sweet . Place the challah in an oven safe baking dish, cover it with a paper towel and set it out for 8-24 hours. This helps the bread dry out and allows it to soak up more of the egg/milk mixture, you want to maximize the sponge-ability of this bread. 

The night before you plan to serve, gather your ingredients (pinch of salt not pictured)

Vanilla...

And while we are on the topic of vanilla please try to use a good one, it really makes all the difference. The downside is it can be pretty pricey. My mom gave us quite a selection of fancy ones a couple Christmas' ago but if she hadn't I would most certainly be making my own. I think this bottle is around $15 so here is a link for how to make the good stuff on the cheap, you're welcome :) 

Ok back to to the french toast...Mix 8 eggs with 5 cups of milk or half and half, add the vanilla and a pinch of salt. 

How many of you caught there are only 6 eggs in the bowl below ;)

Pour the egg/milk mixture over the bread and press the bread down in to the pan. Cover this with an airtight wrap and set it in the fridge overnight. 

Bright and early the next morning...

Place the french toast dish in a water bath. To make a water bath get a larger pan (I either use a roasting pan or those cheep-o disposable aluminum pans from the grocery store), set the french toast dish in the pan and add enough very hot tap water to the roasting pan to come an inch up the side of the baking dish. This is standard step in cooking custard and that's basically what you have going in your pan right now with the addition of bread. Cover both dishes with a foil tent, adding two slashes to the foil to let steam escape. Place the pans in a preheated 350 degree oven. After 45 minutes, remove the foil and bake for another 40-45 minutes.

 

Enjoy!

What is your go-to recipe for guests? Is there anything special you do to help them feel at home?