Pain Perdu (lost bread) is one of the first thing I might have cooked when I was a child. I guess it’s that easy!

As it French names implies it is a recipe created to re-use the leftover bread you have in your kitchen.

This is a recipe you will find very often in my house or at least as soon as I have a  few slices of bread that didn’t find their way to another recipe and were leftover to dry for a couple days.

Of course the purists and some other will tell you that you have to use such and such bread, sure. It is great if you have brioche, but seriously I don’t have brioche in kitchen everyday!

Note: To keep in mind, you want your bread to be a few days old for this recipe. Yes you can buy amazing fresh bread and make this recipe with it but you will soon find out that fresh bread doesn’t soak up as much liquids as the few days old bread and it will fall apart in your pan on the first flip.

Now, in a mixing bowl just add 2-3 eggs (depending on the size of your eggs) to about 2 cups of milk. I usually add about a 2 tablespoon of sugar. I do not like my mix to be too sugary as I usually am very generous at the end with the maple syrup.

Then add a few drops of Vanilla extract, sometimes I add a tablespoon of cognac, try it also with coffee extract or orange blossom flower water (my favorite). Mix it all together with a whisk for a couple minutes or until the ingredients seem to all have incorporated in a smooth liquid.

Then just dip your bread slice in the mixture, pull them out before they become to soggy. In a non-stick pan or a griddle brown a teaspoon of butter and put you bread slice in it before it gets to dark. Let the bread get a nice caramelized color and then flip it.

When both sides are nice and brown just pull them out and serve! I like mine with a raspberry jam, but maple syrup is great too. Some people like to put some confectioner sugar on top, that’s great. I am not too much of a sweet palate so that’s not my thing.

French toast I have seen them here in America often have whip cream or other, seriously for me if it’s for breakfast I don’t need all that on my plate, it disguise the taste of the pain perdu more than anything. If you have made a good milk mix, that’s the only thing you want to taste!

You can also try it as a desert: Cut a shape with your cookie cutter add a scoop of ice cream a few fresh fruit that will do the trick.

Bon Appétit!