Use It or lose It: French Toast Casserole

If you're like me, you have bread in your freezer. I save it all—those big crusty loaf ends, shamefully old hot dog and hamburger buns, sub rolls, and dinner rolls. Until recently, I only used that leftover bread for croutons or bread crumbs.

But oh, I have a new trick up my sleeve now: French Toast Casserole. It's recipe number three of the Use It or Lose It series.

Start with whatever bread you have. Stale or aged-in-the-freezer pieces are perfect for this recipe. Tear it up into small pieces and cover the bottom of your baking dish with it.

In a In a large bowl, whisk together 7-8 eggs, 1 cup of milk, 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla, a teaspoon of cinnamon, and a dash of salt and pepper. Pour over the bread pieces and distribute evenly in the pan.

Next sprinkle 1 cup of grated cheese (whatever you have will do) over the top. If you're up for it, cook some bacon or crumbled sausage and sprinkle that over the top too. Bake in a preheated 350° oven for about 40 minutes until the eggs are set. Let cool for a few before serving.

So good served with a little maple syrup.

This is a great brunch dish, or a super simple recipe if you're feeding a large group for breakfast.

If eggs aren't your thing, there are plenty of good uses for the bread you have hanging around. I had no idea just how many recipes included old bread, and was pleasantly surprised when I googled "uses for leftover bread." Here's a whole list.

The Missing Ingredient

Why must molting chickens take an egg-laying vacation? For over a year now, we have thoroughly enjoyed getting our eggs from our own backyard. I can't tell you the pleasure we take in starting a recipe with a walk to the chicken coop to collect a few eggs—the freshness, taste, and color can't be beat. But we have seen a steady decrease in eggs over the past few weeks and between the four hens we are down to one a day, at best. This is not nearly enough for a family that makes their own bread. We have adjusted by skipping the baked treats, the breakfast sandwiches, and the quiches. Just the thought of purchasing eggs pained me. I relish in the running joke the girls and I have at the grocery store, "Oh we forgot the eggs!" (I pretend to turn the shopping cart around to head for the dairy aisle). The girls giggle and shout "No Meems, we don't buy eggs anymore!"

Well as you may have suspected, I finally broke down and bought some. Not happy about this. And happy about this, at the same time.

A half-dozen eggs, paired with the 2 we had in our fridge soon yielded those mouth-watering cookies for an after-school snack, a quiche for dinner, and some Pilgrim Pumpkin Cake for dessert.

A big thank you to all the chickens out there who are not molting!

Our daughter brought this recipe home from school a few years back and it has become one of our favorites.
Pilgrim Pumpkin Cake with Brown Butter Frosting
2 eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oil
1 cup pumpkin puree
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Frosting ingredients:
1/3 cup butter
1 3/4 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 to 1 1/2 tablespoons hot water

Cake:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease and flour a 9" square pan. Beat together eggs, sugars, oil, and pumpkin. In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients together. Add this to the egg mixture and combine well. Pour batter into pan and bake for 35 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool and spread frosting.
Brown Butter Frosting:
Melt butter over low heat until brown. In a large bowl, beat together powdered sugar and vanilla, add the butter and stir well. Gradually add hot water, beating until frosting is smooth enough to spread.

Attack of the Chickens

Scratched up dirt and rolled rocks...

Trampled tomatoes...

Gravel strewn around the yard...

And one hen who has decided to eat her own eggs (eeewwww!)...

The chickens (more about them here) have been ruling the roost lately—scratching, trampling, helping themselves to the lettuce, and wreaking garden havoc in general. Looks like the time has come to take back the yard. We have our work cut out for us—fencing the rest of the not-yet-fenced gardens, mending trampled veggies, raking dirt and gravel back to where it came from, and replacing the painted rocks back to the borders they make.

As for the hungry hen? We are not so sure. Suggestions welcome.

Happy Birthday, chickens!

Last week marked the first birthday of our crazy chickens, Rocky, Boxy, Feathery and Princess (as you may have guessed, they were named by our small children).

We celebrated their first year with a "cake," made of rice and corn (their fav foods). Our feathered friends clucked happily while they gobbled it up, but we took a pass on having a slice of that treat.

Our first year of raising chickens has been full of memories -- those tiny fluff-ball chicks, their big move into the new coop, the FIRST egg!, the time they escaped while we were on vacation...the list goes on and on, and they still manage to amuse us endlessly.

Our family takes great pride in having chickens as pets and egg producers. We highly recommend it! Anyone interested in learning about raising backyard chickens can read more here.