Baked French Toast

Wow! It's been a long time; for which I promise there are plenty of good (and not so good) excuses. But I won't bore you those and instead will offer a delicious and simply way to make breakfast special: Baked French Toast!

We recently started picking up a really nice bread at a local bakery and have slices with dinner, which is more satisfying than reason can explain. But even we often can't finish the loaf before it crosses the threshold from delightfully chewy to just plain too much work to chew. The recipe below is the perfect solution!

On a slightly unrelated note, there are two new - and very welcome - additions to my kitchen! Introducing ...
A beautiful and perfect in every way Le Creuset dutch oven, from my wonderful husband! I've already made carnitas in this bad boy and have plans for ribs in the near future! I think his gift was a little self-interested, no? :o)

And the red OXO cherry pitter from Williams-Sonoma that I have been eying literally for years. My wonderful friends (and amazingly talented wedding photographers) Justin & Mary sent me a W-S gift card, so I really made the best of it! In the past I have used a chopstick to pit cherries, which is fine. But sometimes, a job calls for the perfect tool and the messy business of pitting cherries is definitely one of those. I am armed and ready for this year's sour cherry season!

Baked French Toast
About 1/2 a loaf sliced (to your preferred thickness)
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups whole milk (or skim milk plus a dash of half & half)
1 1/2 tbsp sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp almond extract
cinnamon

1. Butter a rectangular baking dish and line with bread slices, packing them in tightly.

2. In a separate bowl, whisk milk, eggs, sugar, salt, and almond extract. Pour over bread slices.

3. Sprinkle cinnamon over the bread and let everything sit for about 20 minutes. Preheat your oven to 425 F.

4. Bake for about 30 minutes, until puffy and delicious. Serve with warm maple syrup!

Blueberry Muffins

I'm not sure that the idea of making blueberry muffins in January would have occurred to me had our house guests not left a pint in our fridge. But I'm sure glad they did. Blueberry muffins bring the comfort of more decadent foods without all of the calories and have the added bonus of fruit, which I'm told is better for you that lots of other things I usually gravitate toward for breakfast (read: bacon).

This recipe is from the no-fail blog, Smitten Kitchen, and makes the perfect muffin. Not too big, not too small - just right to have for breakfast and bring to work to share with grateful colleagues. :o)

Blueberry Muffins from Smitten Kitchen

5 tbsp unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
3/4 cup plain greek yogurt
1/2 tsp grated lemon zest
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup blueberries

1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Line a muffin tin with 10 paper liners or spray each cup with a nonstick spray.

2. Beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add egg and beat well, then yogurt and zest.

3. Put flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a sifter and sift half of dry ingredients over batter. Mix until combined. Sift remaining dry ingredients into batter and mix just until the flour disappears. Gently fold in your blueberries.

4. Use an ice cream scoop to fill muffin cups about 3/4 full. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until tops are golden and a tester inserted into the center of muffins comes out clean.

Makes 9 to 10 muffins.

Sour Cream Pecan Coffeecake

When most people hear "spring break" they probably think of warm beachy places and questionable decision making, but my spring break (which started yesterday!) will mainly consist of studying for finals. Since Passover happens so late this year, our break is about 3 weeks before our first final, which means it really should be called something like spring not-so-much break.

But I'm not really complaining, because I've blocked out a good hour each day to just wander around the park, enjoy the warmer weather, take some pictures, (and think about property law).

So in honor of the fact that I don't have to set foot in the law library until April 27th, I baked a coffeecake. A "spring break coffeecake" if you will. There wasn't really anything springy about it. In fact, I accidentally put a dash of nutmeg in it (which I mistook as cinnamon), so if it belonged to any season, it was probably autumn.

But nobody at school complained. And you can always just not accidentally put nutmeg in yours, for a more "season-neutral" version. The cake is a snap to make. And it isn't too sweet, which is why the vein of brown sugar & pecan running through it is so nice.

I baked mine in a bundt pan, because I think the slices seem more like coffeecake that way, but you could also throw it in a loaf pan if you are so inclined.

You could also make more of the "filling" and use 1/2 as a topping ... but I didn't want mine to be overly sweet. For the sole reason that it was easier to justify eating it for breakfast. Which is a pretty silly justification for someone who is perfectly content to eat birthday cake for breakfast. But I digress. Happy spring everyone!


Sour Cream Pecan Coffeecake

1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract

2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1 cup sour cream

Filling
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp cinnamon

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. In a stand mixer, cream butter and sugar. Add eggs one at a time, scraping down the sides as needed. Add vanilla extract.

2. In a separate bowl mix flour, baking soda, baking powder, and cinnamon.

3. Add half of the flour mixture to the butter/sugar/egg mixture. Add half of the sour cream, the rest of the flour mixture, and the rest of the sour cream. Mix until fully combined.

4. In a separate bowl mix the brown sugar, pecans, vanilla, and cinnamon. Grease a bundt pan and pour in half of the batter. Sprinkle the filling mixture evenly and top with the rest of the batter.

5. Bake for 25 minutes and check with a cake tester (it may need up to 10 more minutes). The tester should come out clean. Let the cake set for 10 minutes and then flip onto a plate.

Breakfast Crepes

Sometimes you need something crazy and a little scary to remind you what is really important in life. A reality check. So you can assess priorities with a little more perspective. All of that is my way of saying that a big Sunday breakfast is one of our re-discovered priorities. With potatoes sliced thin and pan-fried with scallions. And uncured bacon. And good eggs.

So to make things a little more special to herald the return of our big Sunday breakfast, I made crepes. We filled ours with those good eggs, scallions, and uncured bacon mentioned above. And to mine I added Jarlsberg cheese. But you could fill yours with anything you like. Anything that would make Sunday special. Like swiss, egg, and spinach. Or cheddar, bacon, & cherry tomatoes.


Oh, and if it seems like our breakfast couldn't get any better ... maybe the best thing about crepes for breakfast, is the extra batter that becomes crepes filled with butter and sugar for dessert. Because why should dessert be reserved for after dinner? Happy Sunday!


Simple Crepe Recipe
Be sure to cook your filling ingredients ahead of time. For dessert crepes (see above), on step three coat with a little butter and a palm-full of sugar.

1 cup flour
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup water
1/4 tsp salt
2 tbsp melted butter

1. Whisk together flour and eggs. Slowly whisk in milk and water. Add salt. Slowly add butter. Whisk until fully incorporated.

2. Heat a pan over a medium-high flame. Butter the pan. Pour in 1/3 cup of batter and move the pan in a circular motion to coat the entire bottom with a thin layer of batter. Cook for 2 minutes.

3. Flip with a spatula. Cover with fillings of your choice. Cook for 2 minutes and fold over.

Langues-de-Chat

These cookies are further proof that everything sounds better in French. Langues-de-Chat (pronounced approximately: long du shat) means "cat's tongue," which references the shape of these delicious buttery cookies. I made these "plain," but, if I had had good chocolate in the house I would have dipped one end. I think you could also spread chocolate between 2 cookies and create a homemade milano.

These are light and go perfectly with milk, coffee, or tea. But are also delightful on their own. They are also a snap to make and bake up literally in 6 minutes. One of my favorite aspects of this cookie is that you use a piping bag to form the cookies, which adds to the "fun factor" and ease.

I think I will revisit these and play around with different flavor combos. Next time I might do lemon/poppy seed, with a higher lemon flavor. Or maybe dipped in chocolate and rolled in pistachios.

Langues-de-Chat
8 tbs. butter, room temperature
3/4 cup confectioners' sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. lemon zest
1/8 tsp. vanilla extract
3/4 cup flour
2 egg whites, room temperature

1. Preheat oven to 400 F. With a rubber spatula mix butter and confectioners' sugar thoroughly. Add salt, zest, and vanilla. Mix to incorporate.

2. Add half of the flour, mix. Add all of the egg whites, mix. Add the remaining flour and mix until combined. It should be truly mixed, but do not over work the batter.

3. Pour batter into a piping bag and snip the end. Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper. Pipe 2 inch straight lines about 2 inches apart on the sheet. Bake for 6 minutes. The cookies should begin to brown around the edges, but still be light on the insides.

Kugelhopf Rolls

This recipe is not easy. There are many steps and a lot of waiting around for dough to rise. Which is a little bit frustrating, because *ideally* you have these fresh out of the oven in the morning. So to make that a reality I was "patiently" staring at dough at 11:30 on a Friday night. After an introduction like that you may be wondering why I bothered posting this at all. But you just have to believe me when I say that the taste truly does make it worth it.


The dough is yeasty and buttery and almost has the texture of a popover, but without all the air inside. This must come from letting the mixer do its thing for about 15 minutes (which, at 11pm, I thought might have my neighbor knocking on my door...). So if you have some time, and are up for a bit of a challenge, why not be rewarded with these delicious little guys?


[ps: I just got a flash and clearly haven't really figured out the best way to use it. Thanks for bearing with me :o)]

Kugelhopf Rolls barely adapted from theKitchn

2 tablespoons warm water
1 1/2 teaspoons dry, active yeast
1/3 cup warm whole milk
1 3/4 cup divided
1 teaspoon almond extract
2 eggs
1 egg yolk
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons butter, softened

2 tablespoons melted butter
1/8 cup granulated sugar

1. Stir together the water and yeast until dissolved. Mix in the milk.

2. Add 3/4 cup of flour until it forms a smooth batter. (I had to add a little extra water at this step).

3. Cover and let sit for at least 20 minutes. It should double in size.

4. In a separate bowl mix eggs, yolk, almond extract. Stir this into the yeast mixture after it has risen fully.

5. In your stand mixer bowl combine 1 cup flour, sugar, and salt. Stir in the eggy-yeast mixture, mixing until it forms a shaggy dough.

6. Fit your mixer with the dough hook and mix on medium-high for 5 minutes.

7. Reduce the speed to medium and add the butter, about 1 tablespoon at a time. Wait until each chunk has incorporated before adding the next; and scrape down the sides as needed.

8. Increase the speed back to medium-high and let it mix for 10 minutes.

9. Turn the dough out into a clean bowl, cover, and let rise for 1 1/2 hours.

10. Place the dough in the fridge over night.

11. The next morning (so glad you're still here!), turn the dough onto a floured working surface. Don't be afraid to use enough flour that it doesn't stick. Roll the dough into a rectangle about 1/2 inch thick.

12. Brush the dough with melted butter, leaving a dry perimeter and sprinkle with sugar.

13. Form the dough into a roll starting with one of the shorter ends and gently making your way to the other.

14. Cut the dough into 12 even slices and place in a muffin tin. Cover and let rise for an hour.

15. 15 minutes before baking, heat your oven to 375 F and bake them for 18-25 minutes depending on your oven. They are done when the internal temperature is 200 F.

Little Lemon Breakfast Cakes

I bought cake flour in July with the expectation of making scones. Fast-forward almost 7 months and I finally got around to using it. Not as I originally planned, but for these cute and tasty concoctions. They are definitely not scones, or biscuits, but are really more like breakfast cakes. They are not too sweet (just 1/4 cup of sugar), the glaze gives it a nice lemony kick, and the cake flour makes them super light.

They are the perfect way to make morning a little extra special. Or to bake for a friend coming over to study criminal law (as was the case here). They also come together and bake up really quickly, which is great if you have a legal writing assignment to finish. Enjoy!

Little Lemon Breakfast Cakes

2 cups of cake flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/4 cup of granulated sugar
zest of 1 lemon
1 1/3 cup heavy cream
juice of 1 lemon

3/4 cup confectioner's sugar
juice of 1 lemon

1. Sift flour, baking power, salt and sugar together. Add the zest.

2. In a separate bowl combine the heavy cream and lemon juice. Slowly add the liquid mixture to the dry, stirring until just combined.

3. On a floured surface knead the dough. Don't be afraid to add enough flour to make the dough manageable. Gently spread the dough until 1/2 inch thick.

4. Using a biscuit cutter, cut circles and place on a parchment covered baking sheet.

5. Bake for about 20 minutes until the bottoms are just browned.

6. In a separate bowl whisk together lemon juice and confectioner's sugar. When the cakes are done, let cool for a few minutes and then cover with glaze.

Scottish Breakfast for Dinner

This isn't really a recipe, it's much simpler than that. This is a meal we make when we don't want to cook. Or when it's too hot run the oven or boil a pot of water. But really it's a dinner we have when we want to summon the feeling of our favorite place.

Scotland is breathtakingly beautiful. And as the place I spent every August as a child, it will always have a very special place in my heart. But it is also where Tom and I had the most wonderful vacation in 2009. We explored the countryside, we climbed twisty castle staircases, and we ate. Oh boy did we eat.

The British Isles have a bad food reputation. And while blood sausage and haggis are acquired tastes (haggis really is quite good if you have an open mind), we had the best breakfasts ever at a wonderful bed & breakfast heading toward Oban on the western coast.

Our morning meals were slightly different each day, depending on which heavenly smoked fish was available (Barney Greengrass eat your heart out!), but three things were consistent on our plates: eggs, baked beans, and fried bread. I'm smiling just thinking about those mornings. Overlooking the incredible green hillsides with the crisp wet air blowing as we feasted.


So I guess you could call this a memory-meal. The flavors transport us to a favorite place and remind us of a perfect vacation. And what a yummy memory it is! Do you make a meal to remind yourself of a special place or time?

Scottish Breakfast for Dinner
2 soft scrambled (or fried) eggs with scallions
Heinz vegetarian baked beans
1 piece each of fried toast
2 links each of sausage or slab bacon
1 stewed tomato (optional)
Smoked salmon (optional)