Rare Breed French Toast
Written January 9th, 2012 by go lb. salt
Categories: Booze, Bourbon, FACON, Recipes, Sel Gris de Guerande'
Monday morning. Ugh.
The weekend is over. It’s back to the grind – off to work, or get the kids to school. Fight traffic, encounter grumpy rude people and try to rely on the memories of less stressful weekend mornings gone by to get you through the next five days.
We thought we’d offer a little help to get you to next weekend with something you can look forward to making at home and you have all week to collect the necessary food items (total: 5)!
There is no breakfast more childishly delicious or adultly savoir faire than french toast. You can find them as finger food “sticks” at the place where they do it “your way” with a version of maple syrup that doesn’t even closely resemble anything maple-y at all. (BLECH) You can find it at virtually any restaurant or chain that serves breakfast – but rarely can you find it served in a manner that makes you say, “Oh…….WOW……THAT is good!”
And without thinking, you offer to share one of the few bites of french toast goodness you have with whoever you are with, without giving a single thought to the most disturbing of facts: You have ONLY a finite number of said bites before the mind-bending goodness completely disappears from your plate. (silly you! We’ll cut you some slack for this egregious error in judgement. After all, the coffee may not have kicked in yet.)
Hopefully the portion was 1) large enough to share and 2) left you full and satisfied rather than in deep despair because you are still hungry and wish you had another plate of THAT french toast! In either case, life just got a WHOLE lot better…
Enter the crazy foodie from our test kitchen. If you’ve met him you know that he likes to use booze in his food as much as he likes to use salt, and this recipe doesn’t disappoint. We’ve put an adult spin on French Toast and used one of our favorite local breads too!
Tempe based Great Harvest Bread Co. makes the most ridiculously yummy incredibly delicious combination breads. These are the kind with spinach and feta, or cornbread with cheddar and jalapeno or in this case (cue the dramatic music and deep voiced announcer)…CINNAMON SWIRL EXTREME. You really have to try it to understand why it’s soooo…… oh words just won’t do it justice…not even really big words!
WARNING: You will also need a bottle of GOOD Kentucky Bourbon (not Maker’s Mark or Jim Beam) but you don’t have to buy a whole 750ml bottle. Get one of those small 50ml bottles from the liquor store if you want. You AREN’T going to drink any of it (unless a good stiff shot first thing in the morning is part of your weekend breakfast routine), and you ARE cooking the alcohol off. It’s for the unique flavor that only bourbon can impart – seriously! If you can’t (for whatever reason) use the bourbon in this recipe, that’s ok. It’s still REALLY good without it. If you can and choose not to…we’re here to tell you…”You ARE missing out!”
Rare Breed French Toast
6 eggs
1 shot Wild Turkey Rare Breed (yes, we know its 108 proof)
1/4 c. half & half
1 loaf Great Harvest Cinnamon Swirl Extreme
1 pinch Sel Gris
2 pinches FACON
4 pats butter (unsalted, sweet cream – of course!)
Directions:
Whisk eggs, half & half and bourbon together in a bowl.
Slice bread into 1/2” – 3/4” thick slices.
Melt butter in pan on medium heat.
Place enough slices of bread in bowl to fully submerge each and leave to soak for approximately 10-15 seconds. Then place in pan to fry. Sprinkle equal parts Sel Gris and Facon on the uncooked side before flipping the pieces over.
Cook both sides to a nice golden brown allowing the inside to cook long enough too. (you might have to try a piece during the process to make sure you are cooking them correctly – food safety concerns and all, of course!)
Once you’ve made all the french toast you care to eat, use the remaining egg “wash” to make scrambled eggs.
We DO NOT recommend using any type of syrup or sprinkling this toast with powdered sugar. Enjoy it as it is…and while you are….let the stress of the current week melt into oblivion as you look forward to your new weekend breakfast ritual.