Hello to all you budding chefs! My New Year’s Resolution is to not leave you hanging and continue to bring you easy tips for easy recipes in the kitchen. One of the best things about winter is how much baking gets done, like this Baked Apple French Toast.
Baking is one of the best things you can do during the cold months. Here in Davenport, Iowa, where we rung in the New Year with 12 straight days of sub-zero high temps, there are a lot of Baked Apple French Toast dishes to be made!
Winter Baking is for Everyone
Whether you prefer breakfast (the Baked Apple French Toast you see below) the sweets (like brownies and cakes) or the meats (like chicken or this steak I told you about), baking during the winter is a tremendous way to keep you feeling all warm and fuzzy inside. You can bake just about anything, so long as you have a working oven. What you do is up to you!
The biggest key is understanding the internal temperature of the meats or how sensitive the sweets you make are to heat. As for adding flavor, it’s basically a blank canvas. Say you’re baking chicken or steak. Whatever you bake with it will soak into the meat. A little tip: what you’re adding as flavor should have a similar color to the meat. For example, chicken is great with lemon or white wine while a steak is better with balsamic vinegar or bourbon.
Meanwhile, if you overcook a tray of cookies they will be way too stale. Nobody likes stale sweets so play it safe. As long as the top and sides are firm, you’re golden. An easy way to tell is by sticking a toothpick in the center of the treats. If it goes in soft and comes out clean, or just a couple of tiny crumbs, it’s perfect.
However, as this Baked Apple French Toast proves, just cause it’s a little messy doesn’t mean it’s not amazing.
Baked Apple French Toast
If you’re like me, you love apple pie. It’s one of the hallmarks of the holidays yet it should be for any time. After all, the saying literally is “as American as Apple Pie”. And if you’re exactly like me, you love breakfast. The best and most important meal of the day. So, I found this recipe to be a great way to mix both and an excuse to make it any time of day. I put my own little spin on it and, using the new camera I got for Christmas (thanks, Mom and Dad!), documented it for you guys.
Ingredients
2 cups of milk
7 eggs
4 apples peeled and cored
8 slices of whole grain bread, cubed
1 tsp. of cinnamon
1/2 cup of brown sugar
2 tbsp. of butter
Process
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
Put bread in a greased 9×13 baking pan. Make sure the cubes cover the entire bottom of the pan, but if they come up about halfway that’s fine too.
Whisk the eggs, milk, and half the cinnamon in a small bowl (whisk eggs first or the milk and cinnamon will darken the mixture & you won’t tell the eggs are beaten). Pour mixture over bread, push down to make sure it all starts soaking.
Cook apples in a large skillet on medium-low heat with the butter. Sprinkle half the cinnamon on top, stir, and cover. Let cook for 4-5 minutes, or until the apples are tender. Remove the cover and sprinkle half the brown sugar on top. Continue to cook for approximately 2-3 minutes.
Sprinkle remaining brown sugar on bread mixture and coat with a small dusting of cinnamon.
Add the apples to the bread mixture, making sure squish the apples down into the cracks of the bread.
Bake for 50 minutes. Serve with syrup and enjoy!
