French toast should be made from slabs of good-quality white bread – nothing fancy like brioche, though, as it’s too soft and the end result will be soggy. The sweetcorn purée thickens as the batter is cooked, creating a custardy centre with crisp edges
Ingredients
- day-old white bread 4 thick slices
- corn on the cob kernels (fresh or tinned) 200g
- whole milk 300ml
- eggs 4 large
- maple syrup 2 tbsp, plus extra to serve
- brown butter 2 tbsp, (see notes below)
- vegetable oil for frying
- butter for frying
TO SERVE
- icing sugar 1 tbsp
- ground cinnamon 1 tsp
- blueberries 300g
Method
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Step 1
Heat the oven 130C/fan 110C/gas ¼. Put the bread slices on a wire rack, then bake in the oven for 20 minutes to dry them out.
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Step 2
Meanwhile, make the batter. Put the sweetcorn and milk into a blender or food processor, and whizz until smooth. Pour through a fine sieve into a bowl, pressing down on the purée with the back of a spoon to extract as much liquid as possible. Whisk the eggs, maple syrup, brown butter and a pinch of salt into this liquid (discard the solids) until smooth.
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Step 3
Lay the bread slices in a shallow roasting tin and pour over the batter, turning each piece to coat. Leave to soak for 5 minutes, turning the slices occasionally – they should soak up almost all the liquid.
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Step 4
Heat a little oil and butter in a large, non-stick frying pan and fry the soaked bread slices, in batches, for 2 minutes on each side until golden.
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Step 5
Mix together the icing sugar and cinnamon, then dust over the hot toast. Serve with the blueberries and plenty of maple syrup.
To make brown butter, put 50g butter in a small pan and cook over a medium heat, whisking, until it smells nutty and looks brown. Pour into a heatproof bowl and cool.
Recipe extracted from Root & Leaf: Big, Bold Vegetarian Food by Rich Harris (£19.99, Kyle Books).
Discover our best French toast recipes here, including, our epic peanut butter and jelly recipe...
Nutritional Information
- Kcals 420
- Fat 22.1g
- Saturates 9.6g
- Carbs 37.4g
- Sugars 21.5g
- Fibre 4.8g
- Protein 15.7g
- Salt 0.8g
