How to Make Bread Stale for French Toast (And Why You Should)

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Are you someone who loves eating French toast for breakfast? So many people find it to be a delectable morning treat.

This is a breakfast food that you should only enjoy occasionally due to it containing many calories. Even so, it’s hard to resist the allure of French toast.

To make this breakfast dish properly, you need to use stale bread. How can you make bread stale for French toast, though?

Continue reading to learn about your options. You’ll also learn some related information that will help you to enjoy your breakfast to the fullest.

Do You Need Stale Bread for French Toast?

It’s recommended for your bread to be slightly stale before you use it to make French toast. You can try to make French toast without stale bread, but the results are typically less than ideal.

Luckily, it’s simple enough to make the bread stale. Later, you’ll learn about some methods that can help you to make the bread stale faster.

Why Use Stale Bread?

Using stale bread for French toast is recommended because it helps to keep the bread from getting too soggy. When you use fresh bread for French toast it gets overly soggy and doesn’t turn out properly.

When the bread is just a bit stale, it’ll soak up the mixture in just the right way. You’ll be able to cook it just fine and you’ll be pleased with the results.

So it’s truly ideal for you to wait until the bread has gotten just a bit stale. It might take a bit of patience, but you’re better off waiting.

Drying Out French Toast Bread

Drying out French toast bread so it’ll be a bit stale is simple. Start by slicing the bread and laying it out on a cooling rack overnight.

Of course, if you’re using pre-sliced bread, you can just lay the slices out on the rack. Leaving the cooling rack exposed to the air overnight will help the bread to get stale.

You will make the bread get stale faster by having more of its surface area exposed to the air. This is why you’re leaving the bread spread out on the cooling rack.

A simple wire cooling rack is enough to get the job done. It’s convenient to have a rack like this when you bake things often.

Use the Oven to Dry the Bread

Using the oven to dry the bread is a great idea when you don’t feel like being patient. Not everyone wants to have to wait until the next day to enjoy French toast.

You can put the slices of bread in the oven for ten minutes. Preheat the oven to 275 degrees Fahrenheit and then put the slices of bread in there.

After ten minutes have passed, the bread will be significantly dried out. The dried-out bread will be ready to be used for French toast.

This method is simple and it doesn’t take a lot of time. For most, this is going to be the most practical way to prepare the bread for making French toast.

Dry Bread vs. Stale Bread

Both dry bread and stale bread will work for French toast. However, there are differences between dry bread and stale bread that you should know about.

Remember that slightly stale bread is good for French toast. Incredibly stale bread is less than ideal.

When the bread is stale it’s going to lose its flavor. Also, it’ll be far chewier than normal when it’s in this state.

So you don’t want the bread to be very stale when you use it to make French toast. It’ll make the breakfast dish unappealing and you likely won’t want to eat it.

Instead, it’s better to use dry bread. When the bread is dry it’ll be in a perfect state for making French toast.

The bread will still have great flavor and it won’t be overly chewy. You can soak it in the custard and it won’t get too soggy.

You can use slightly stale bread to make French toast, but you don’t want to use very stale bread. For the best experience, just use dry bread.

Since you can dry the bread yourself in the oven, this is going to be an easy process. It only takes ten minutes and you’ll be pleased with the results.

Be Sure to Use Bread That Is Thick Enough

You won’t be able to make good French toast if you don’t use the right type of bread. Thin bread is very bad for French toast.

This is because bread that is too thin will get overly soggy when you soak it in custard. It won’t turn out properly and is thus not appropriate for French toast.

To get the best results, it’s recommended to use bread that is at least three-fourths of an inch thick. You can use bread that is as thick as one inch if you want to.

Don’t use bread that is thicker than this, though. Bread that is too thick won’t cook all the way through and that won’t be any good either.

What’s the Best Bread to Use for French Toast?

Some types of bread are better than others for French toast. Most people agree that brioche is a fantastic option.

Brioche is tasty and it has the right thickness for French toast. If you use this type of bread, you’ll be very pleased with the flavor and the texture.

You can also choose to use pullman loaf or challah. Both of these bread types are great and will make French toast that you’ll be pleased with.

When you buy French toast at restaurants you’ll usually see that they’re using one of these three types of bread. Stick to these options and you’ll have a good experience.

Should You Soak French Toast Overnight?

Remember that French toast needs to soak in the custard for a certain period of time. If you don’t soak the bread for long enough it won’t turn out the way you want it to.

This doesn’t mean that you have to soak the bread overnight, though. Although, you can soak the bread overnight if that’s the route you’d like to take.

Some French toast recipes call for you to soak the bread in the custard mixture overnight. Others will simply ask you to soak the bread for at least fifteen minutes.

Generally, it’s best to soak the bread for fifteen or twenty minutes before cooking. Soaking overnight can also be satisfying, but it isn’t necessary if you wish to make French toast faster.

Important Cooking Tips

Making French toast isn’t necessarily hard, but you can make it simpler by utilizing certain tips. If you want to have a good experience, be sure to avoid cooking your French toast too fast.

Trying to cook the French toast fast and using a higher temperature than normal is a bad choice. It’ll lead to the toast turning out soggy and it won’t taste good.

Be sure to follow the temperature advice on the recipe that you’re using. Also, always remember to preheat your pan or griddle before getting started.

If you want to make sure that everything turns out good, it’s wise to grease the pan. You should grease the pan using both butter and oil to get good results.

The presence of oil helps the butter to avoid burning quickly. The butter will still burn if you try to cook several batches of French toast with the same butter and oil, though.

You should wipe things clean before each new batch. This gives you a clean slate and allows you to put new butter and oil in the pan.

Failure to do this can lead to you having black specks stuck to your toast. It’s gross to have to deal with burnt butter flecks, but it’s easy enough to avoid by making good choices during the cooking process.

If you need to keep the French toast warm while you’re making more batches, keep your oven set on its lowest setting. You can place the French toast slices that are finished on a baking sheet and store them in the oven so they can stay warm.

This gives you time to finish everything up. It’s handy if you’re trying to make it so everyone can eat at the same time.

Final Thoughts

Now you know that you can make bread stale or dry so you can use it for French toast. This is easy enough to do by simply leaving the bread slices out on a cooling rack.

You can also dry the bread out in the oven by preheating it to 275 degrees Fahrenheit. Allow the slices to stay in the oven for ten minutes and you’ll be ready to start using them to make French toast.

Remember that slightly stale bread is good for French toast while very stale bread is bad. Bread that is too stale doesn’t taste good and you don’t want to use that for your breakfast.

It’s much easier to simply dry the bread out using the oven. Generally, this is the method that most people recommend using.

You don’t need to be too patient since you can simply preheat the oven and prepare the bread whenever you want to. Just be sure to use the right type of bread that’s appropriate for French toast.

Having more information about how to make French toast turn out perfectly will help you so much. You should have a great time enjoying French toast for breakfast with your family.

Just don’t make this tasty breakfast treat too often. Remember that it’s best saved for special occasions or used as a weekend treat due to being high in calories.

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