Nothin' Says "I Love You" Like Stuffed French Toast

At least that's the case if your hubs is a die-hard breakfast man as mine is.

The setup. 

(Note: I should have used 3 eggs for the two large pieces of french toast I made.)

The store was out of challah when I got there, except for one loaf that had raisins in it, and since I know the hubs is not a fan, I went with brioche instead. Annoyingly, the brioche also had a HOLE in the middle  due to air bubbles, which I did not know until I started making breakfast the next morning. That made stuffing the french toast much more difficult. Oh well. I persevered.

The pocket.

In order to make stuffed french toast you could simply make regular french toast and put a tasty filling between two slices. Instead I chose the harder way.

I sliced the bread extra thick, and then cut a pocket about 3/4 of the way into the bread in which to spoon the filling of choice. This time around for the filling I simply combined roughly equal parts good strawberry preserves and room temperature cream cheese, because the fresh strawberries that would garnish looked and smelled divine. Simple but super tasty is the way to go.

While the brioche was sucking up scrambled eggs, a splash of cream, a TSP of cinnamon, and a waft of nutmeg (I don't know how else to describe it... about 6 passes over the fine microplane) I got started on the... appetizer? Amuse bouche? Whatever. The tasty first round, also known as BACON.

Ammendment: Nothing says "I love you" like stuffed french toast and BACON.

Note: the longer you let the bread sit in the egg mixture, the more flavorful and decadent your french toast will be. I'm not talking days, but twenty minutes can make a big difference.

The rest was pretty straight forward. I poured the fat from the bacon out of the pan, added about a TBSP of butter, and cooked the egg-laden toast until crispy on both sides. (In the same pan for "essence of bacon" in the toast :)

 Fresh strawberries, extra filling on the side, a dusting of powdered sugar, and the extra piece of bacon the hubs kindly saved for me while I was still cooking. (I totally ate one piece before serving him because I wasn't sure I'd get out of the kitchen in time to eat any myself!) and breakfast was done.

And really, really good.

Try it out some morning when your S.O. is especially deserving.