Day 48: Late Breakfast

Workouts. . .
10-minutes of yoga. Yep, that’s it.

I didn’t have to work today or tomorrow, which lead me to be extra slothful and overeat embarrassingly. I won’t go into great detail here but after my Italian feast, I came home and took an antacid and gas deflater before bed, then I drank peppermint tea to dissolve the perma-garlic aura toxifying my immediate area. Let that be a lesson to everyone. Okay, honestly, I truly didn’t overeat enormously at dinner, but our two-hour wait had us eating around 8 p.m. People who know me also know that I get testy around 5:30 when dinner doesn’t look immediate, so waiting that long made my blood sugar scream and my stomach revolt when the food was actually eaten. Just adding a shot of honesty to the tale.

Anyway, the nice thing about not having to work was that I DID have time to make a good breakfast for once. This is a recipe that I’ve made time and again with soaking real slices of challah. This time, I had burned the tops of my challah braids (which I make myself), and so I needed a recipe to use it rather than throw it away wastefully. I decided to make more of a custard and cube the bread, and it turned out to be amazing. If you’re not using burned bread, you can reduce the milk to 1/2 cup and dip fat slices in the batter. I usually pan-fry it on butter until crisp and then bake 20 minutes at 400º. Still tastes amazing. You can also use any kind of egg bread with this recipe and substitute almond for vanilla to make a variety of different tastes. Brioche also tastes amazing.

Baked Challah French Toast
1/2 loaf of challah bread, cut into 1” cubes
4 eggs
1 c. milk (I used 1%)
1/2 tsp. Vanilla
1/2 tsp. Orange extract
zest & juice of one orange

Heat oven to 350º and spray a 9” deep baking dish with cooking spray. Whisk eggs until frothy, then add other wet ingredients. Mix well. Arrange bread cubes in baking dish and pour custard over them. (If you have time, you can let them soak overnight, which makes them extra mixed and yummy.) Bake with foil over top for 30 minutes, then remove foil and bake another 20-25 minutes, until puffed and golden on the top. Serve with powdered sugar and lots of maple syrup, just like regular French toast.

If you have extra time and want to be gourmet (or nerdy, as I call it), mix a teaspoon of orange extract and 2 T zest into a cup of maple syrup and heat it on the stove over low heat while you’re baking. This adds another layer of orange flavor for fruit lovers.

What I ate today. . .
tea with milk and baked challah French toast with powdered sugar and syrup; two slices cinnamon bread; a piece of leftover cottage cheese loaf with salad; maggiano’s dinner — chop salad with no cheese or prosciutto (still yummy!), vegetable appetizer plate (shared with three others), and 1-1/2 c. spaghetti marinara; herbal tea before bed.