French Cinnamon Toast

This French toast recipe is one of those weekend breakfast treats which I like as a reward for a week of porridge or muesli!  Personally I like a drizzle of maple syrup but for the children a little drizzle of runny honey does the trick.  With a sprinkling of icing sugar you can elevate it from a breakfast dish to a bona fide dessert.

Ingredients

• 8 slices of brioche or thick-sliced white bread
• 2 large eggs
• 4 fl oz / 115ml full fat milk
• 4 fl oz / 115ml single cream
• A pinch of salt
• 1 tablespoon caster sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 oz / 30g unsalted butter

Method

Place four slices of the bread in a baking dish.

Put the eggs, milk, cream, sugar, salt, vanilla and cinnamon in a bowl and whisk.

Pour half of the liquid over the bread and allow to soak in.

Melt half the butter in a frying pan on a medium heat.

Start frying the bread, as many slices as your pan will hold at a time, until golden brown on each side.

Repeat the above steps with the remaining four slices of bread using the remaining half of the liquid.

For a real moment of naughty indulgence you can drizzle on some maple syrup, runny honey, or sprinkle with icing sugar.

Tips

Make sure the bread has plenty of chance to soak up the liquid in the disk before transferring to the frying pan.

Trivia

Despite its name, French toast was not invented by the French, and pre-dates even the founding of France. According to Apicius, a book of recipes dating from the 5th century CE, the Romans had a dish called pan dulcis in which bread was soaked in milk and egg then fried in oil or butter. By the time of King Henry V (victor of the Battle of Agincourt), a recipe called pain perdu (“lost bread”) was all the rage. The recipe used stale or “lost” bread by soaking it in egg and milk before frying it.