Brioche french toast with bananas & salted caramel

I love breakfast food.

No really, I really really love it. I've been eating homemade pancakes every weekend since forever, and I must have made them literally a hundred times. It's easy, it's quick, and I've got the whole routine down pat.

But sometimes, I feel like going all out and start preparing for weekend brunch the night before. Hence, brioche french toast was born.

Image 1. Finished product. Glorious.

It's a lot of work, but it will be worth it, I promise.

Let's start with the brioche, shall we?

Don't you hate it when recipes are written for like a million servings, though? And then you adjust the recipe for what you need and you end up needing something ludicrous like 1/3 of an egg. This brioche recipe makes three loaves. The hell am I gonna do with three loaves of bread? Just..no.

So as someone who doesn't need to feed a family of four, this is the recipe that I used:

The sponge

• 2 tbsp warm skim milk, about 100F
• 1 tsp active dry yeast
• 1 egg white
• 2/3 c unbleached all purpose flour

The dough

• 2 tbsp granulated sugar
• 1/4 tsp kosher salt
• 1 egg and 1 egg yolk (see what I did there? I ain't about wasting chicken placenta.)
• 1/2 c unbleached all purpose flour
• 1/4 c butter, room temperature

Now, in terms of instructions, you can just follow the recipe that I linked above (adjusting the amounts for the above recipe, obviously). First you mix the warm milk, yeast, egg white, and 1/3 cup flour to create a "sponge." Make sure the milk is warm so the yeast can thrive. Sprinkle 1/3 cup flour over the top and this is what it will look like:

Image 2. The sponge

Then you have to wait until you see the surface crack, like this:

Image 3. Do you see dem crackz? DO YOU SEE DEM?

Image 4. Crackz up close

Then, add the egg, egg yolk, salt, sugar, and 1/3 cup of the remaining flour. When those ingredients come together, sprinkle in the rest of the flour. Meanwhile, bash the butter into submission (the recipe's words, not mine) until it is the same consistency as the dough. Incorporate the butter one tablespoon at a time.

Add more flour if the mixture is too runny, and your dough is complete! Now cover it and let it sit overnight.

Image 5. Good bye for now, dough

When I woke up the next morning, the dough was basically the same size as it was before. FAIL. My best guess would be that the milk wasn't the appropriate temperature. Now that I have purchased a candy thermometer, I shouldn't have that problem anymore. Please keep that in mind though. Temperature is key!

Now time to make the salted caramel!

• 1/2 c granulated sugar
• 2 tbsp water
• 1/3 c light cream (heavy cream and/or half & half will do!)
• 2 tbsp unsalted butter
• 1/2 tsp coarse sea salt

Heat the sugar and water in a saucepan, bringing it to a boil. 

Image 6. Boiling sugar water

Do not stir. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 375F, because it's brioche time.

In about 5 minutes, the sugar water will turn a dark amber color.

Image 7. Sugar water caramelizing

When this happens, take the saucepan off the stove and stir in the cream, butter, and salt. Set it aside and let it cool. It's that simple!

The oven should be heated by now. Divide the brioche dough into six pieces and shape them into balls. Arrange the six balls in your bread pan in a 2x3 layout. You can add an egg wash over the top if you wish, but as I said, I ain't about wasting eggs. Bake for 30 minutes and it should look something like this:

Image 8. Freshly baked brioche!

30 minutes is ample time for your caramel sauce to cool.

Image 9. Mmmm salted caramel.

Now for the home stretch. Time to actually make the french toast by slicing and coating the brioche in egg, then frying it with some butter on a skillet. My recipe for the egg batter is as follows:

• 2 eggs
• 2 tbsp milk
• 1 tbsp brown sugar
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp salt

Fry the bread on medium-low heat, throw on some sliced bananas, sprinkle some powdered sugar, drizzle with salted caramel, and BAM. You got yourself some ballin' french toast.

Image 10. BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS

This recipe serves two. If you are short on time, you can use store-bought brioche, but I recommend making your own salted caramel since it's so easy. You can save the leftover caramel for another time and eat it with some ice cream. Delicious.

Try it! You won't regret it. :)