Frugal Feeds | French Toast Five Ways

Using up stale bread is a staple of frugal living. So, to continue on yesterdays theme I am going to continue talking about what to do with that left over bread.

French Toast is broken down into a few simple components--

1. Bread that is unpalatable as it is.
2. Something that makes the texture of that bread palatable.
3. Something that makes the taste of that bread palatable.

The bread does not need to be French Bread. It can be any bread. But what makes French Bread make great French Toast is the chewy crust and airy, absorbent body. When thinking about turning that stack of unpalatable bread into French Toast consider the breads current components. Then consider what you will want to do to modify that bread so that everyone in your household is not only willing to eat the bread, but actually eagerly anticipating its yumminess.

The Basics--Traditional French Toast Custard Dip
To moisten your stale bread you need a custard dip. The traditional dip consists of egg, milk, vanilla and sugar. You can enhance this a million ways and modify it with different qualities of the basic ingredients. Using cream or skim milk makes significant differences. Using egg whites, tofu or bananas in place of the eggs makes a huge difference in texture and flavor. Pure vanilla, artificial vanilla, vanilla beans, orange flavor, almond flavor, no flavor--all result in totally different tastes. Brown sugar, syrup, stevia, all make a difference. Really, once you learn the basic custard dip you can make it as different as your imagination allows--but take it a step or two at a time and see what you like. Changing too many things too fast could result in recipes that don't work very well. Experiment, but do it a few things at a time.

My Version of the Basic Traditional Custard--For 8 thick slices

2 Eggs, beaten
1 cup 2% Milk
2 Tablespoons Brown Sugar
1 Tablespoon Pure Vanilla Extract


So, lets look at a few different types of common bread and how we want to modify them:

Day old French Bread--Slice at a diagonal into 1 inch thick ovals. Use a straightforward custard mix. Serve with Honey, Maple or Fruit Sauce. French Bread with the custard is traditional and tastes great. No need to doll it up.

Day old Sour Dough Bread--Slice as above or, if it is pre-sliced sandwich style, consider whether the slices are too large and if so, cut in halves. Sour Dough is naturally tangy so you are going to want to make that work to your advantage. You can do the traditional custard but it will just taste good enough. Lets make it great by removing the milk from the custard and replacing that with half apple juice and half apple sauce. A bit of cinnamon is nice too. Now when your family eats this they won't need any sugar or syrup and will enjoy a Green Apple French Toast.

Stale Plain Jane Bread--If the bread is soft or soggy toast in the oven for 10 minutes or until dry. Then, modify the traditional custard by reducing the milk by 1/3 and adding 1 pureed ripe banana. The more over-ripe the banana the better the flavor, so use up the one that looks the most unappetizing. Add a pinch of nutmeg. Serve with Maple syrup and toasted pecans. Creates Maple Pecan Banana French Toast.

Stale Wheat Bread--Modify the traditional custard by reducing the milk by 1/3 and adding 1/2 cup pureed berries. I puree my berries with a stick blender. If there are a lot of seeds, like blackberry or raspberry puree would create, then strain through a wire mesh strainer. Creates Berry French Toast.

Stale Raisin Bread or other moist sweetened bread--Eliminate the brown sugar from your traditional custard and reduce the milk by half and add cinnamon. Makes Cinnamon Raisin French Toast.


Cooking it--
I prefer to use my large griddle and set the temp at 350 or medium. I set up the work area in an assembly line. Stack of bread next to bowl of custard next to the griddle. When the griddle has reached temperature I butter it lightly. Then I dunk the bread, roll it around in the custard and then put it right on the griddle. I repeat until all 8 pieces are on the griddle. I cook them until they are well browned on both sides and no longer steaming. The lack of steam indicates that the interior of the toast is fully cooked. This can happen very quickly with sandwich sliced bread or may take quite a while for thick, not too dry, bread. Adjust your temperature accordingly. If you think the center will cook quickly, you can raise the temp a bit. If you think the center will cook slowly, lower the temp. That way the exterior can brown and not burn.

French Toast freezes just great too. When it is cooled just set it on a cookie sheet in the freezer for the day. That night place into freezer bags, label and close. If your freezer might give it a strange taste because of frost in the space you can also just put straight into the freezer bag, foregoing the cookie sheet but the pieces may stick together and you will get ice crystals inside the bag. To eat just place in a 275 degree oven for 15 minutes or until warmed through. (You can also microwave them but the texture isn't great.)

Frugal Feeds Begins

Lets start off with an oldie but goodie that really takes little effort and will give you a dish full of food at the end of the month.

Get two gallon sized zippered freezer bags. Label one Sweet Bread Ends, the other Savory Bread Ends. Put today's date on it--or just an indicator like First Monday of the Month. Put it in the freezer. Now, for the next 30 days every time you get to the end of a loaf of bread, add the ends to the bag. Have hot dog buns that didn't get used up? Add them to a bag. A bagel gone stale--Bag it. Italian bread from Spaghetti night? Just make sure that if it has any garlic that it goes into the Savory Bread Ends bag, not the Sweet Bread Ends bag. Any bread part, piece or more that is in danger of being thrown out for not being used--put it in the bag. Raisin bread to the sweet bag, Cheese bread to the savory, etc...


30 days have passed and you have 4 cups or more of bread and no idea what to do with it.

(You can scale this easily--if you have one cup just use 1/4 of the recipe quantities. If you have 2 cups, use 1/2. 3 cups, 3/4ths.)

Here are some starters:

Take it out of the freezer in the morning and let it sit on the counter, in the bag, until it defrosts. Usually about an hour. Once it is defrosted cut it all up into cubes. Big or small is up to you and how you want to proceed with it.

I am going to give you two recipes. Very simple recipes that you can build on.

Recipe #1 Croutons

The first is for croutons--now, don't go running off just yet. The croutons are made so that you can make other recipes with them too, not just for crunchy salad stuff.

Place your oven rack squarely in the center row of your oven. Preheat your oven to 325 degrees.

Take two cups of the savory bread cubes (or half), place in large bowl and toss with salt, pepper and a bit of dried herbs to your taste. You can also add 2 Tablespoons of oil for crispier croutons, but it isn't necessary. Spread one layer thick on a walled cookie sheet. Straight edged cookie sheets will cause them to slide off after baking. Bake in the oven for about 25 minutes. If they are small croutons 15 minutes may do the trick. Larger ones may take 30 minutes or more. Check that they are crispy all the way through. You want them to be thoroughly dried because you want to be able to keep them on hand in the cupboard for an easy dish without thawing.

Now, they are ready to be used for your salad--but they are also ready to made into stuffing, bread crumbs and crispy toppings for casseroles.

To make into Stuffing take 1/4 cup celery, 1/4 cup onions and a teaspoon of dried sage and saute in 3 Tablespoons low sodium broth in a medium sized pot until the celery and onions are glossy and a bit soft. Add 2 cups of Savory croutons and 1/4 cup low sodium broth, stir well, put a lid on it and remove from heat. It is ready to be served in five minutes.

OR

To make into Bread Crumbs, pulse the croutons in a food processor.
To make the bread crumbs into Crispy Topping, just before use, add 1 Tablespoon dried Parsley and 2 Tablespoons Parmesan cheese. Sprinkle on top of the casserole 15 minutes before casserole is to be finished baking in the oven.

Recipe #2 Bread Pudding

Place rack in center of oven. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Spray a small casserole with cooking oil or grease with butter or coconut oil.

Add 2 cups of sweet or plain bread cubes to the casserole. In a large bowl make a custard slurry. 

Combine: 
1 1/2 cups 2% Milk
2 beaten Eggs or 3 beaten Egg whites
2 Tablespoons Brown Sugar
1 teaspoon Vanilla
Pinch of ground Nutmeg
1/2 cup of leftover fruit. 

Mix together thoroughly. Pour slurry over the bread cubes. Make certain that the cubes have all been doused with the slurry and press down top edges slightly so that the surface of the bread is fairly even.
Bake for 45 minutes. Tips should be browned, center set.
 
The fruit can be over ripe bananas, frozen berries, raisins (soak raisins in hot water or hot juice or hot brandy for 10 minutes), peaches, pineapple or a mix of leftover fruit. Melons need to be seeded, cubed and pureed and then cooked until half of the liquid is evaporated and it is more like a jam that you swirl into the slurry after you have added the slurry to the cubes. If no fresh, frozen or canned fruit is available, a few Tablespoons of preserves works too, but I recommend swirling that over the top after you have added the custard slurry as well. (You can add it to the slurry but the fruit flavor is constant that way, while if you add a swirl it is a nice contrast from bite to bite).

The slurry above, minus the fruit, also makes a decent French Toast Batter. Although adding over ripe Bananas is yummy also. Just make sure they are pureed before hand.

Here is the best thing about these recipes. They are plain Jane, simple. Easy to remember but also easy to modify. Too sweet? Change the sugar. Too little fruit? Add more. Want more spices, you know what to do... It really is difficult to make these not turn out right because they taste pretty good just by themselves, so if you add to them it helps. And, it makes them yours. Just don't add too many things too fast or you might increase your cost of the item and make it taste too mixed up.