Glass of Win

Oh, breakfast. My favorite meal of the day. When I don’t have a tasty breakfast I’m in a rotten mood for hours. I love playing around with new flavors with regards to pancakes and French Toast because they’re the most versatile of the breakfast assortments and adapt rather favorably to new twists. Try this variant on an old breakfast favorite. Super easy and big payoff!

CITRUS VANILLA FRENCH TOAST
with raspberry sauce!

Raspberry Sauce:
1 basket of fresh raspberries
OR
1 bag of frozen organic raspberries, thawed with lukewarm water or a few hours in the fridge.

Puree raspberries in your blender until smooth. Run through a chinois (fine mesh sieve) to remove seeds.

Place raspberry puree in a small saucepan.

Add either agave nectar, molasses OR Karo corn syrup (to taste, just to cut up the tartness of the raspberries and add a little thickness)

Stir constantly over a low-medium heat, do not boil. Remove from heat when it has reached your preference of sweet/tart and your preference of consistency.

Lemon
In a wide bowl, mix:
1 egg (lightly beaten)
1/2 c. milk
1-2 tsp. vanilla extract
zest of a small lemon

Drench your favorite kind of French Toast bread in the mixture, fry up in a small non-stick pan (or skillet lightly coated with cooking spray). Cook until golden brown on both sides, plate up.
Drizzle raspberry sauce on top.

Optional: serve with mint garnish and/or a dusting of powder sugar.

Orange
In a wide bowl, mix:
1 egg (lightly beaten)
2 TBS milk
1/3rd c. orange juice
2 tsp. vanilla extract
zest of a small orange

Cook as you would regular French Toast. Garnish with orange wedges. Serve and enjoy!

I love breakfast foods. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, late-night munchie and brunch, I’m there. I’ve never skipped breakfast in my life; it’s not just the most important meal of the day, it’s the most comforting and delicious. Are you into breakfast foods?

Recipes: Blueberry Corn Pancakes & Cherry-stuffed French Toast

BLUEBERRY CORN PANCAKES
shared by Anja via Veganomicon

Ingredients
3/4 cup flour (all purpose or whole-wheat pastry flour)
1/2 cup cornmeal (make sure it’s the finely-ground variety)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons canola oil
1 1/4 cup vanilla almond milk (OR rice, soy, hemp, hazelnut, cow)
1/3 cup water
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 tablespoons honey (OR pure maple syrup, agave nectar)
1 teaspoons grated lemon zest
1 cup fresh blueberries
Cooking spray or a little oil for greasing the pan

Directions
1) Preheat a large non-stick pan on medium-high heat

2) Sift together flour, cornmeal, baking powder and salt. in a
separate bowl, combine all other ingredients (except blueberries and
cooking spray). Add wet to dry, mix until just combined, then fold in
the blueberries.

Do not over mix or the pancakes will be tough, a couple of lumps is okay!

3) Spray pan with cooking spray. Use a 1/4 cup measuring cup or an ice
cream scoop to pour out batter into pan. Cook pancakes until brown on
bottom and bubbles form on top. Flip pancakes over with a thin spatula and cook until bottoms are brown and pancakes are barely firm to the touch.

Transfer to plates.
Repeat with remaining batter, adding more oil to the pan as needed.
makes 8-10 pancakes

NOTES
- This recipe is originally vegan. I switched out the maple syrup for honey.
- I used whole-wheat pastry flour
- I never measured my blueberries; I used about 3/4ths of a basket and topped the pancakes with leftover blueberries & butter. Anja recommends agave, a little bit of coconut oil, or soy-yogurt.

STUFFED FRENCH TOAST

Ingredients
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1/4th cup vanilla almond milk (or whatever milk you use)
1/4th tsp. vanilla extract
1 TBSP Grand Marnier
4 slices of bread

Filling
Vanilla Greek yogurt
Morello cherries (purchased at Trader Joe’s)

Grease a skillet with cooking spray, heat up skillet.
Mix the first four ingredients together in a bowl.
Mix yogurt & cherries in separate bowl.
Coat both sides of a slice of bread, lightly fry both sides and place on a waiting plate nearby.
Repeat with one more slice, but after both sides are lightly fried, add filling mix to one side, place pre-fried slice on top, flip & re-fry again until golden brown.
Repeat with other two slices.
Plate up, sprinkle with powdered sugar and dig in!

NOTES
- You can use another skillet or pan to fry both slices at once OR if your skillet is big enough, fry both pieces at once.
- In lieu of yogurt, you can use cream cheese & add vanilla extract and/or powdered sugar for extra sweetness.