Gingerbread French Toast

Charlotte is going to be sharing the versatility of La Brea Bakery Bread by taking you along to make one of her favorite childhood dishes, Gingerbread French Toast.

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Brunch is everybody’s favorite time of the day, even if they won’t admit it. Especially when the smell of French toast in the morning brings you right back to your childhood. Making brunch with my grandma is among some of my favorite memories of my childhood. French toast was one of our specialties. 

This year, I wanted to switch things up a bit and give my French toast a complete some flare with gingerbread flavors. I will admit I am not a big fan of gingerbread cookies. I know, I’m of rare form. But the flavors of gingerbread within the realms of a French toast, are bomb!

Working with La Brea Bakery breads whenever I need bread for a dish, or a meal is an absolute treat. Their variety is impeccable, and quality is top notch! I always have fun trying new breads because I know whatever I try from La Brea Bakery, it’s going to be amazing. So, I had a lot of fun with this recipe. 

I chose to use the toasted sunflower honey loaf. I love the textures in this loaf. It soaks up the lovely gingerbread French toast batter perfectly. Now, I recommend letting the bread slices sit in the batter for at least an hour to overnight when you’re working with denser loaves like a baguette or this toasted sunflower honey loaf. If you choose to use La Brea Bakery’s sandwich bread, you just need to dip the bread slices in the batter and make sure it’s well coated. No need to let it sit and marinate. 

To serve, I like to keep it simple with maple syrup, fresh berries and powdered sugar. But you can always have some fun and try other flavored syrups and maybe whipped cream. But whatever you do, have fun.

    • ¾ cup milk
    • 2 eggs
    • 1 tbsp brown sugar
    • ½ tsp maple extract
    • ½ tsp vanilla extract
    • ¼ tsp sea salt
    • ¼ tsp ground cinnamon
    • ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
    • ¼ tsp ground cloves
    • 1/8 tsp ground ginger
    • 6 ½ inch slices of La Brea Bakery’s toasted sunflower honey loaf
    • 3 tbsp ghee or butter for cooking

Toppings:

    • Fresh berries
    • Powdered sugar
    • Maple syrup

Instructions:

To begin, add the milk, eggs, sugar, maple extract, vanilla extract, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and ginger to a large shallow pan and whisk to combine the ingredients. Add the bread slices to the milk and egg mixture. Flip the bread slices to make sure they are well coated on both sides. 

Cover the pan with foil, or a lid and refrigerate for 1 to 2 hours. You can do this overnight as well. 

Keep in mind the kind of bread you choose. If you are using sandwich or a softer bread, there is no need to let the bread sit in the milk and egg mixture for this long. You can just dip them in the milk and egg batter and cook them right away.

Now, melt the ghee or butter in a large skillet and cook the toast until nice and brown on both sides. This takes about 2 minutes per side. If your pan isn’t wide enough to cook all the bread at once, cook them in batches.

Serve with maple syrup, fresh berries and powdered sugar.