French Toast - Slow Cooker Style

Every year we have a "12 Days of Gluttony" at work. Today was my day, and I decided to go with a breakfast dish. The problem was that I didn't have a lot of time last night to make something extravagant, and I didn't want to get up super early to make something to take warm to work. So I looked to my handy slow cooker, otherwise known as a crock pot. But what breakfast dish can be made in a slow cooker? French toast of course!

I had to do some searching online for a recipe, and I came across the blog A Year of Slow Cooking. There was a post for a slow cooker french toast, and it looked perfect to take to work. I was a little leary about bread and liquid cooking all night, but it turned out really well. The best part is that it was super easy, and I didn't have to slave over a hot stove.

French Toast in a Slow Cooker
Ingredients:
1.5 loaves of french bread
1 dozen eggs
2 t vanilla
4 cups of milk (I used 1 cup of heavy cream and 3 cups of regular 1% milk)
1/4 t salt
2 t cinnamon
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup walnuts, or other desired nuts (optional)
Syrup

I must warn you that I don't actually measure things very well, so those measurements are what the recipe says. Unless, I'm doing actual baking like cookies or cake, I tend to just add however much I think works. So the cinnamon, brown sugar and vanilla were just dumped in.

Back to the recipe...I greased the sides of the crock pot with Pam, but you could use butter or Crisco. Then, I sliced the bread and layered it all in the crock pot. It actually was a lot of bread and barely fit in there. Next I whisked the remainder of the ingredients, except the syrup, together and poured it on top. I didn't use the walnuts because there are some co-workers with nut allergies. I turned the crockpot on low for 6 hours and went to bed.

When I woke up the entire house smelled like french toast. I packed up the crock pot and the syrup and headed to work. The bread was almost overflowing the crock pot last night, but it shrank down to about half the size and was a lovely golden brown color. The edges that had sat up against the side were a little crunchy and the middle was soft. After helping me get everything up to the office, I had one of the carpoolers be my taste tester. After pouring some syrup, he dug in. I think it passed.

Sorry, I didn't take pictures of the final product.

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I'm thankful today

We now sit and watch football, but earlier today we were busy in the kitchen. With the mother-in-law laid up with a bum knee, my sister-in-law and I took over the kitchen to make a yummy Thanksgiving dinner. It turned out great, if I do say so myself.

To the left you can see the carnage that was left over, but first let me give you a tour of some of the things that were made.


For me it started on Tuesday night with the baking of the desserts - pumpkin caramel cheesecake with a gingersnap crust, apple dumplings and a pecan pie. I also took my first foray into bread with the preparation of the dough for the dinner rolls.

mixing

bread rising

Those items were then packed up in a cooler and transported up to Michigan with us. On the way, I talked to SIL to plan the rest of the dinner which would include corn pudding, green bean casserole, sweet potatoes and apples, and other sides. Oh, and the most important thing - the turkey! She came over to the house, and we got to cooking.

the starting of good stuffing

sweet potatoes with apples and walnuts

this is before they cooked

the Hubs got in on the action with a little potato peeling

Since I'd never ventured into bread-making territory before other than the occasional banana bread or zucchinni bread, I was a little worried. I mean the whole yeast thing just scared me a bit. Just in case we had brought some back-up Parker House Rolls, but we didn't need them. After baking one batch of my dinner rolls that look more like muffins, we decided to go with them. They were a hit...or the family was just trying to make me feel good. They ate them at least.

If you can't tell, I'm pretty proud of these little guys. Yeah, they aren't the prettiest rolls that'll ever appear on a dinner table, but they were pretty tasty. Next time though I might tweak the recipe because they were a bit heavy.

So everything was done, and we were ready to eat. So let's dig in.

At this time I had to put the camera down so I could get in on that action. I have to say I sure am glad I had some room in my pants because I ate. We all did. In the end there were only two survivors left at the table along with the carnage.

As you can see, we had plenty of food. I think we might have overdone it, but hey, it's Thanksgiving and who doesn't love Thanksgiving leftovers?

You would think we would be done at this point. Oh no...there's always dessert, and after taking a break, we dug into that as well.

pumpkin cheesecake

pecan pie

apple dumplings

Overall, I have to say good job to the SIL and me. Everyone seemed to have a great time and full bellies. We might have set the bar too high though. This sort of thing might become expected of us.

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