The Best Ever French Toast Casserole
Victoria is a stay-at-home mom, author, educator, and blogger at Healthy at Home. She currently lives in Colorado with her family.
We recently had a good deal of my husband's family over to visit us. When I know we're going to have a bunch of visitors over for longer than a day or so, I stream line our meals a little by setting up a menu ahead of time. I come up with a few nice breakfasts, a few nice lunches, and a specific dinner every night so that I'm not hunting for what we're going to eat and scrambling to pull ingredients together at the last minute.
This amazing French Toast Casserole is one of my nice big breakfasts that makes everyone happy. My husband is crazy about French toast, and so it only makes sense to make some for everyone. However, waking up in the morning and trying to pull together French toast for everyone is a huge hassle. This easy to pull together casserole allows me to create a great, healthy breakfast with plenty of protein to keep everyone going throughout the day, and all I have to do it toss it into the oven first thing in the oven.
In fact, the first person that woke up in the morning tossed it into the oven for me! 45 minutes and everyone had plenty of breakfast. Perfect!
Cook Time
Prep time | Cook time | Ready in | Yields |
---|---|---|---|
12 hours 30 min | 45 min | 13 hours 15 min | 12 servings |
Ingredients
- 1 loaf French Bread
- 2 (8oz) packages cream cheese
- 12 large eggs
- 2 cups milk
- 1/2 cup maple syrup
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
Instructions
- Spray a rectangular casserole dish (9 x 13) generously with cooking spray.
- Break up the entire French Bread loaf into tiny pieces (I used my kitchen shears to help me with the thick, tough bread.) and spread them evenly across the casserole dish.
- Unwrap and soften both cream cheese bars in a small container in the microwave for 30 seconds to a minute, just to get it to a smooth consistency where you can spread it.
- Remove your cream cheese from the microwave, and using a spatula, spread it as well as possible evenly across the top of the French Bread cubes.
- Whisk together your 12 eggs (I promise this is right.), your milk, maple syrup, and cinnamon until evenly mixed.
- Pour your egg mixture evenly over your French Bread cubes and cream cheese.
- Cover with saran wrap tightly and refrigerate overnight.
- When you wake up the next morning, preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Bake your casserole, uncovered, for 45 minutes or until golden brown.
- Yummy, yummy! Enjoy!
Set out some powdered sugar and some maple syrup and you have French toast on demand. Even with 12 servings and 12 people that we were serving, we ended up with some extra, and everyone got a couple of decent servings. It was delicious! It always is.
Our family said that it tasted more like bread pudding when you didn't put the powdered sugar and maple syrup on it. The cream cheese always seems like way too much every time I slather it on, but you don't really notice how much is really there as you're eating it. In fact, my husband says it makes it super creamy. Just know that without the maple syrup, it may seem a little dry.
If you'd rather not use the syrup, add another cup to a cup and a half ahead of time and that should solve the dryness of it. Everyone always loves it! Next, check out my Asparagus Quiche that is also a hit every time family comes to visit.
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Comments
Victoria Van Ness (author) from Fountain, CO on May 22, 2013:
Oh my gosh. That sounds amazing! As if this dish couldn't get any better. I'll definitely have to try it that way. Thank you!
Mrs Frugal from United States on May 22, 2013:
My family loves french toast casserole. My favorite recipe is my friends that uses Hawaiian roll bread instead of French bread. It also has chopped walnuts on top. It is truly the best I have ever tasted! Hope you have a great day.