Easy BBQ Leftovers French Toast Casserole

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. 

Spiced Brown Sugar Butter

• In a medium mixing bowl, combine the ¼ cup softened butter, ¼ cup brown sugar, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon nutmeg, and a pinch of sea salt.
• This recipe is about using what you have. If you don’t have brown sugar, you can easily swap in white sugar, turbinado, or coconut sugar. For substituting in liquid sweeteners like maple syrup or honey, use just 2 tablespoons.
• Same for the spices, use what you have. Or ginger, cloves, allspice, and pumpkin pie spice make great options.
• If you don’t have any sugar or spices on hand, you only need the butter for greasing the pan.
• Use 1 tablespoon of the compound butter and use it to grease the pan.

French Toast Custard

• In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together 4 cups of milk, 6 large eggs, ⅓ cup white sugar, 2 teaspoons vanilla extract, ½ teaspoon sea salt, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, and ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg.
• Half and half, whipping cream, and even coffee creamer can work for the custard. You can also replace 1 cup of the milk with yogurt or sour cream. NGL, melted vanilla ice cream can also work. Options.
• If you use a liquid sweetener like honey or agave, reduce the dairy by 2 tablespoons.
• The spices can be omitted or swapped out as before.

Easy BBQ Leftovers French Toast Casserole

• This recipe works with a lot of different bread types: hot dog buns, hamburger buns, sandwich bread, dinner rolls, bagels, English muffins, pita bread, naan, flatbread, flour tortillas, and even cake or doughnuts.
• Bagels, English muffins, pita or any slightly stale breads are especially thirsty. If you have a lot of those types, you may want to reduce the amount of bread cubes from 10 cups to 9 cups so there is enough custard.
• You’ll want a total of 2 cups of mix-ins. ½ cup fruit, ½ cup sweet mix-ins, and 1 cup peeled and diced watermelon rind is a good balance, but mix it up per your leftovers.
• For the fruit, great options are: berries, bananas, pineapple, stone fruit, cherries and grapes. Sweet mix-ins include: chocolate, marshmallows, graham crackers, cookies, brownies and chopped nuts.
• Add the 1 cup of diced watermelon rind to the remaining Spiced Brown Sugar Butter and mix to fully coat.
• Layer the bread cubes into the pan with the fruit, sweet mix-ins, and watermelon rind. Dot any leftover compound butter throughout the casserole.
• Pour the custard over the layers.
• Let it sit for 30 minutes, pressing the bread down a couple of times as it soaks.
• Then check it.
• It looks right: The bread is fully soaked. Tiny pools of custard are visible between the pieces, and it looks moist but not soupy. It is ready to bake!
• It looks too dry: If the custard has been absorbed but there are dry spots, pour up to ½ cup of milk over the dry areas. Let it sit for 15 minutes, and check.
• It looks too wet and you have more bread: Tear up more pieces of bread and press it in. Let it sit for 15 minutes, and check.
• It looks too wet and you don’t have more bread: Give it 10 more minutes to soak, pressing the bread down again. If it is still soupy, carefully pour off some of the excess custard.
• It looks like you don’t have enough custard: You can make more custard using the ratio of 1 egg, ⅔ cup dairy, 2 teaspoons sugar, ½ teaspoon vanilla extract and a pinch of spices and sea salt.
• The goal isn’t for the liquid to be completely absorbed before baking, but for all the bread to be fully saturated. It should look moist, sorry, but not soupy.
• Loosely cover the pan with foil.
• Bake it for 40 minutes. Remove the foil. Bake it for another 20 minutes until the center is set and the top is golden brown. Keep baking in 10 minute increments if needed. Careful not to dry it out.
• Remove from the oven and let it cool and set for 10 minutes before serving.
• Serve warm with 2 cups cubed watermelon. Other great options are whipped cream, ice cream, syrups like maple or chocolate, and any leftover fruit or sweet mix-ins.
• Enjoy!