Blueberry French Toast Casserole
Blueberry French Toast Casserole is loaded with blueberries, cubes of fluffy French bread soaked in custard, cinnamon, nutmeg, and a touch of sweetness from brown sugar crumble!
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French Toast Casserole is great for feeding a crowd, it has all the flavors of traditional French toast without having to man the stove to make individual slices of French toast.
Why This Recipe Works
This easy French Toast Casserole recipe is fancy enough for celebrations or special occasions like Christmas morning. It's a great way to use leftover day-old bread or stale bread. Love pancakes? Try this Blueberry Pancake Casserole.
A delicious breakfast casserole that can feed a large family with minimal effort, like these Blueberry Sourdough Scones! If you prefer to set it and forget it try my Slow Cooker French Toast.
Simple Ingredients
- Bread: I think French bread is the best bread for this casserole, but you can use other bread varieties like sourdough bread, brioche, challah, and croissants. Any of these options would work nicely.
- Blueberries: You can use fresh blueberries or thawed frozen blueberries.
- Eggs: Use large, if your eggs are medium or small you may want to add a couple more.
- Milk: Whole milk for the full richness in the flavor profile
- Spices: Cinnamon and ground nutmeg
- Vanilla extract
- Brown Sugar: Either light or dark will work. I also top it with optional powdered sugar
- Flour: all-purpose flour for topping
- Butter: keep it cold and cut into small pieces
- Pecans: or other chopped nuts for topping. You can omit the nuts if desired.
How to Make This Blueberry French Toast Casserole
- Step 1: In a large bowl, whisk the eggs, milk, spices, brown sugar, and vanilla extract together.
- Step 2: Cut crusty French bread into 1-inch cubes and place in a large bowl. Pour egg mixture over the cubed bread toss to coat and let soak.
- Step 3: In a small bowl, add the topping ingredients. Use a pastry cutter or fork to blend together until crumbly.
- Step 4: Transfer soaked crusty bread to a prepared baking dish. Add blueberries with the topping on top of the French Toast Casserole. Sprinkle with crunchy topping on top and bake!
Recipe Tips
- This can be served as is, with powdered sugar sprinkled on top, or drizzled with real maple syrup.
- Super soft, fresh bread actually isn't ideal. If your bread slices are a few days old, or even a little stale, they'll soak up the egg custard mixture even better.
- Blueberries aren't the only great option here. You can make this with any fresh berries. Strawberries and raspberries with the blueberries would really make this the best French toast casserole.
- Leftover casserole should be stored in an airtight container for up to 3-4 days in the refrigerator. Or freeze for up to 3 months, thaw before reheating in the oven.
Recipe Faq's
Essentially, this is a make-ahead recipe. For best results, it needs to chill in the fridge for a minimum of three hours, but ideally overnight. I like to make this overnight breakfast casserole the night before and then pull it out to come to room temperature a bit before I start preheating the oven the next day. Then you just remove the covering, pop it in the oven and wait for it to bake.
An easy baked French Toast Casserole is great all by itself, but goes well with many other breakfast items. Some of my favorites to serve alongside this are breakfast sausage links, bacon strips, with an Omelet, fresh fruit with yogurt, or with a big serving of Steak and Potato Breakfast Hash.
More than likely it's the bread you used. If you choose bread that's too soft like sandwich bread, it won't be able to soak up all the custard.
More Breakfast Casseroles
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Blueberry French Toast Casserole
Ingredients
- 1 loaf French bread 10 cups
- 1 ½ cups fresh or frozen blueberries
- 8 large eggs
- 2 ¼ cups whole milk
- 1 teaspoons cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ¾ cup packed brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon vanilla
For the topping
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 1/3 cup all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 6 tablespoons cold butter cut into small pieces
- 1/2 cup chopped pecans
Instructions
- Grease a 9x13 baking dish with non-stick cooking spray.
- Cut the French bread into 1-inch size cubes, and place in the baking dish.
- Top the bread with the blueberries.
- In a medium bowl whisk the eggs, milk, cinnamon, nutmeg, brown sugar, and vanilla until combined.
- Pour the egg mixture over cubed bread and blueberries and gently toss until coated.
- Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 3 hours or overnight.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Remove dish from refrigerator.
For the topping
- In a small bowl add the brown sugar, flour, cinnamon, and cold butter. Using a pastry cutter or fork blend until crumbly.
- Sprinkle evenly over the top of the casserole.
- Bake for 50-55 minutes or until golden brown.
- Sprinkle with powdered sugar.
Aww Sally so great to hear, thanks for the great review 🙂
My sister makes this dish often and recently shared the recipe with me. Simple to make and oh so good! I have used different breads each time - challah, brioche and french. All worked well imo. My family and friends thank you for sharing!
Thanks, Gail, that's so sweet, glad you're here 🙂
I'M an avid follower on your site....not only are the recipes easy and yummy but the videos don't waste time by dragging out each and every step !!
Many thanks