Apricot Brandy and Almond Baked French Toast

After a few days spent recovering from graduation festivities, we’re finally ready to post the final component of our goodbye brunch – a delicious and mildly alcoholic baked French toast that we’re proud to have come up with ourselves (mostly!). The inspiration comes from Smitten Kitchen’s boozy baked French toast, but since we already doused our sorbet in kahlua (Smitten Kitchen’s booze of choice), we decided to try ours with almonds and apricot brandy.

You may be unfamiliar with apricot brandy, but we know it from such things as the apricot brandy sour, a drink that’s quite popular among friends. Apricot brandy is actually very tasty and light, perfect for fluffy, soft French toast. Since baked French toast soaks overnight and cooks in the oven in the morning, we just added a bit of the brandy to our soaking mixture and let the flavor seep through. We added layers of almond slivers between the layers of toast, and served it with (your choice of) powdered sugar or berry topping.

Ingredients:
1 loaf Challah, brioche, or thick Italian bread, cut int0 1-inch slices,
3 cups whole milk
3 eggs
3 tbsp apricot brandy
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup almonds
powdered sugar (optional)

(for berry topping)
2 cups frozen berries of your choice (we chose mixed)
1/2 cup granulated sugar (or to taste)

Instructions:
Grease a 9×13-inch baking dish. Arrange one layer of bread tightly in the pan, sprinkle with half of the almonds. Arrange the second layer on top, and sprinkle with remaining almonds.
Whisk together milk, eggs, sugar, salt, brandy and vanilla, and pour over the bread. Wrap the baking dish tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight. In the morning, bake at 425 for 30 minutes, or until puffed and golden. To make berry topping, combine berries and sugar in a saucepan. Bring to a soft boil, then simmer for an additional 5-10 minutes. You can mash the berries to your desired consistency. Serve toast with powdered sugar, berry topping, or both.

Cinnamon Swirl Bread

This is the bread that we always dreamed we would bake.

The dough was beautiful from the start -- elastic and soft. It rose like a beast, and sprang back after we punched it down. It hardly clung to the counter, folding easily into a roll. In the oven, it rounded out into a tall and golden loaf. The slices were evenly swirled, fluffy and chewy, and unbelievably delicious. The bread is sweet enough alone, but when you get to the heavily swirled, gooey bits in the middle, it's something quite special.

We've found that it's best to bake breads when there are several unimportant things to do, but nothing pressing. Today's bread took about four hours total, but we were able to fit the steps in between loads of laundry and watching Rock of Love II with Brett Michaels. We found the recipe on Cooks Illustrated this morning, and adjusted it for our standing-mixer-less kitchen. It requires some patience and steps, but we'd recommend it in a second.

Given our trouble getting doughs to rise, this (and challah) absolutely mark our most successful bread recipes yet. Like we mentioned, it's a dream loaf come true.

Ingredients:
(dough)
1/2 cup milk
4 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1 package dry active yeast (2 1/4 tsp)
1/2 cup warm water
1/3 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/2 tsp salt
3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra

(filling and glaze)
1/4 cup sugar
5 tsp ground cinnamon
milk for brushing
1 large egg
2 tsp milk

Instructions:
Begin with the dough. Heat milk and butter together in a small saucepan until butter melts. Cool to lukewarm. Meanwhile, sprinkle yeast over warm water in a large bowl. Using a wooden spoon, stir slowly in a circular motion while adding sugar, eggs, salt and lukewarm milk mixture. Continue stirring a bit more quickly, and add 2 cups of flour until mixed thoroughly, then add remaining 1 1/4 cups flour until mixed through. Add more flour if dough seems extremely sticky. Remove dough from bowl, and knead on a floured surface for about 10 minutes, adding more flour as necessary, until dough is smooth and elastic. Place in covered, greased bowl to rise for 2 to 2 1/2 hours, until doubled in size. Once risen, punch dough down once in the center, and let rest for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, mix cinnamon and sugar together for filling, and grease 9x5 inch loaf pan. Roll dough into an 8x18 inch rectangle, with the 8 inch side facing toward you. Brush milk over dough, and sprinkle cinnamon and sugar over it, leaving a 1/2 inch edge on the side farthest away. Beginning with the side closest to you, roll dough into a log shape, pressing ends together to make sure that it does not become more than 8 inches. Pinch dough ends together to form a tight seam, and push ends of dough toward the center. Pinch outside dough edges together to form a seal. Place the dough seam-side down into the loaf pan, and press down evenly. Let the dough rise more until it is about 1 inch above the edge of the pan (30-60 minutes). Preheat oven to 350, and combine milk with egg. Before baking, brush this mixture over the top of the loaf. Bake for 30-35 minutes until golden brown, and let cool for 45 minutes before serving.

A Tale of Two (Oat Bran) Breads

It was the best of doughs, it was the worst of doughs. Actually, it was two doughs. For the first one, we decided not to activate the yeast before mixing it into the flour. When its growth seemed stunted after two hours, we decided to start a second loaf, this time activating the yeast first. After an additional two hours, both loafs were about the same size, but the second dough was much more elastic than the first one, which was lumpy and heavy. After baking the loaves, we didn't notice difference in taste, though the second looked a bit fluffier. The lesson: Activate yeast first, or prepare to wait longer for dough to rise.

In retrospect, we're glad that we baked two loaves -- considering that the first was gone after breakfast this morning. Because of the slightly honeyed taste in the bread, we used slices for paninis last night with honey-roasted turkey, mustard and roasted vegetables. For breakfast, toasted with a touch of butter. This bread was easy, delicious-smelling and tasting, and even healthy. Perfect for sandwiches or anything, we've already planned to remake recipe (which comes courtesy, of course, of Mark Bittman).

Ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup oat bran
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp yeast
1/4 cup warm water
1 tsp sugar
1/4 cup honey
2 tbsp butter, slightly melted
1 cup milk
3/4 cup rolled oats

Instructions:
Add yeast and sugar to warm water, stir and let sit 15 minutes. Combine all-purpose flour, whole-wheat flour, oat bran and salt in a food processor. Pulse for 5 seconds. Through a tube, add butter, milk and honey. Pulse for about 30 seconds, until the mixture comes together. Knead in rolled oats by hand. Form dough into a ball, place in a greased bowl, and cover for about 2 hours, until the dough approximately doubles in size. Punch the dough down, and let it rise for another 15 minutes in a loaf pan, while you preheat the oven to 350. Bake for 45 minutes, until well-risen.

Cranberry Walnut Bread

Bread scares us, it relies too heavily on conditions beyond our control. Is the room too hot? Too cold? Is the yeast still active? And even if the dough seems stringy and flexible and it's risen considerably -- is there any way to really know whether the lump of wet flour will become into a fluffy and beautiful loaf?

We suffered a fright yesterday. Our recipe said that the dough would rise in two to three hours, but it didn't. With no clue what to do, we guessed, kneading it down and then letting continue to rise for another four hours after that, until it had sufficiently doubled in size. Miraculously, it turned out. This always happens to us; disaster looms until the last minute and then somehow it all works. How? To quote a favorite movie: I don't know, it's a mystery.

Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp salt
1 tsp instant or rapid-rise yeast
1 1/2 cups water
1/2 cup cranberries
1/2 cup walnuts

Instructions:
Pulse flour and yeast together in the food processor for 5 seconds. Add water and pulse again until the dough forms a shaggy, sticky ball. Remove from the food processor, and add the nuts and cranberries. Place the dough ball in a bowl and cover lightly with plastic wrap or a towel. Let sit for 2-3 hours, until the ball has doubled in size. If yours doesn't seem to be rising well, consider punching down or kneading it (requires more flour) and letting it continue to rise -- don't rush it into the oven. 30 minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 450. Bake for 20 minutes, turn the oven to 350 and bake for an additional 25 minutes, till the crust has lightly browned. Remove, cool, slice, serve.

Challah

Before this week, my most recent attempt at challah was in pre-school, when I stood in line with 10 other kids for the chance to brush a stroke of egg yolk over the ready-to-bake loaf. But having graduated ourselves from the school of kneadless bread, Alex and I felt determined Saturday morning to try something more challenging and hopefully more rewarding. We chose challah, a Jewish sabbath bread, because it was the only recipe that didn't require a trip to the grocery store.

Now I just said that baking challah is more challenging than baking kneadless bread which is true, but that doesn't mean that the recipe is actually difficult -- it's not. The recipe calls for hours of waiting, so while the entire process takes a while, the actual work time is minimal. And each ounce of effort put into creating a challah will be rewarded x10 when you see how beautifully the dough rises into a golden loaf. We each gave a little yelp of joy when we first peeked into the oven.

Soft, sweet and eggy, challah begs to be lathered in honey, reborn into french toast, and pulled from the loaf in handfuls for mindless snacking.

Ingredients:
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp salt
2 tsp instant yeast
1 tbsp honey
3 eggs, plus 1 yolk
1 1/3 cups milk, warmed slightly
butter or non-stick spray for greasing a pan

Instructions:
Mix flour, yeast and salt together. Add honey, eggs and milk to the mixture, and knead together. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes, using additional flour if necessary. Form the dough into a ball, and let it sit in a covered, greased bowl for at least 1 1/2 hours to rise. When you are ready to prepare the dough for baking, divide it into three pieces, and role each piece out into a long rope, about 15 inches. Braid the pieces, pinching the dough together at each end. Preheat the oven to 375, and let the dough sit while the oven heats. Before putting the dough in the oven, brush egg yolk over it. Bake for about 40-50 minutes, until golden.

Apple Bread

We met Alex's parents in New York this weekend, and they spoiled us like crazy: fancy brunch, a shopping spree at Zabar's, a case of awesome wines... it was paradise. But the gift that truly set our hearts aglow (besides their wonderful company!) was the bag of fresh Connecticut apples.

We wanted to keep some of them for snacking, but a few begged to be baked into a delicious dessert, so we obliged. Of course, we turned to Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything and his apple bread recipe did not disappoint. We made it our own healthier version with the usual whole wheat flour and smart balance substitutions. Moist and nutty, warm and aromatic, sweet and easy to bake, this could even work as a side dish or toasted for breakfast.

Ingredients:
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup cornmeal
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp baking powder
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup melted smart balance
2 eggs
1 1/4 cups skim milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup apple, peeled and grated
1 cup walnuts, chopped

Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350. Combine all of the dry ingredients in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, beat eggs, milk and butter together. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour the wet ingredients, apples, and walnuts into it. Using a spatula, mix everything the batter together. It should be pretty lumpy. Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan and bake it for about an hour, until a knife comes out clean. Let it cool, then serve.

Kneadless Bread

This recipe from Mark Bittman caused a huge stir on the interwebs a few months ago. But we are slow, and kept forgetting to buy yeast, so today marks our first attempt at the baking the famous kneadless bread. The New York Times video is no longer available, but you can check out the clip on YouTube instead. This recipe is AMAZING. Please make it, you will not regret it. It is as easy as it looks, and it tastes like a cloud, and now the apartment smells like a bakery. Yay.

Ingredients:
3 cups flour
1/4 tsp instant yeast
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups water

Instructions:
Mix dry ingredients together. Add water, pull the dough into a clump, and don't knead it. Let it sit for 12 hours. Preheat the oven to 500. Fold dough into a loaf over some flour, and put it inside a preheated pot/cast-iron skillet/pyrex container. Bake it for 30 minutes covered, and 15 minutes uncovered. Let it cool, and eat it up.