French Toast with Brioche Bread

This delicious cinnamon french toast with brioche bread is a great way to use up stale brioche bread.

Brioche bread makes the perfect bread choice for french toast. The enriched and tender bread base soaks up the egg mixture in which it’s dipped so that the inside becomes creamy and custardy.

The soaked bread pieces are fried in a generous dollop of butter until golden and crispy on the outside but perfectly moist on the inside.

The brioche bread

I use my homemade sourdough brioche bread for this french toast recipe. It makes a couple of loaves at a time, and what we don’t eat fresh becomes french toast!

Brioche bread is very tender by nature because of the large amount of egg and butter present. It is therefore the perfect vessel to soak up the egg dipping mixture. You want to use stale brioche though, as this will hold its shape best. If your brioche is too fresh it can become soggy.

If your brioche is too fresh, you can make it stale by baking the slices in a low oven at around 150°/300°FC for around 5 minutes to dry it out.

The milk and egg mixture

The mixture in which the brioche is soaked is made from simple ingredients.

• Milk
• Eggs
• Cinnamon
• Vanilla
• Salt

Whisk it all together until combined. You’ll notice that the cinnamon will clump in the mixture, so do the best you can to whisk it up. If you want an extra cinnamon taste to the french toast, you can sprinkle it with a little cinnamon sugar at the end.

Thick brioche slices are dipped in the egg mixture for around 1 minute on each side. How long they can soak depends on the staleness of your bread. If you feel the bread is still very hard after 1 minute on each side you can leave it to soak a little longer.

In the same regard, if the bread becomes too soft after a minute, reduce the soaking time.

Frying the brioche

You need butter to fry the brioche to golden perfection. Oil just won’t give the same flavor.

Fry the brioche in a large pan, a few pieces at a time for around 3 minutes on each side until golden.

Serving

Serve the french toast while still hot, stacked on plates, and smothered with maple syrup.

We like to add berries too, or some sliced banana.

Additions and substitutions

• You can use other enriched bread if you have no brioche, like challah or stale croissants. Alternatively, use a french stick or other lean breads instead. This will create a chewier french toast as opposed to a creamy custardy one.
• Sprinkle cinnamon sugar over the fried french toast for an extra cinnamon touch.
• Make a french toast bake instead.

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