Peaches-and-Cream French Toast Casserole

I recently stumbled upon this recipe in one of my magazine and my love for peaches (when you have Fredericksburg zip code it's completely natural) made me instantly yank the entire page from the binding. A few weeks later, I knew it would be the perfect tailgate breakfast for the Missouri game and as a make-the-night-before recipe that you pop into the oven the next morning, it would be a great bake-and-take breakfast. Every bite of this recipe is filled with the taste of summer and fond memories of a french toast breakfast.

Peaches-And-Cream French Toast Casserole

1 8 oz Loaf of French Bread, cubed

8 Large Eggs

2 Cups Milk

1/4 Cup Sugar + 1 tsp

1 tsp Vanilla Extract

2 15 oz Cans Sliced Peaches in Juice, Drained

1/2 Cup packed Brown Sugar

1 tsp Cinnamon

1/2 Cup Heavy Cream

Butter a 9"x13" baking dish and arrange bread cubes. Whisk eggs with milk, 1/4 sugar, and vanilla until well blended and pour over bread. Arrange peaches on top and sprinkle with brown sugar, cinnamon, and 1 tsp sugar. Cover and refrigerate overnight or 8 hours.

Remove from fridge 30 minutes prior to baking and preheat oven to 350 degrees. Pour cream into a small pan and bring to a boil over high heat; cook until reduced by half (10 - 12 minutes). Drizzle over the top of casserole and bake, uncovered 45 - 55 minutes until lightly brown on top. Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

This went over extremely well at the tailgate and made me long for summer to be here even sooner so I can use Fredericksburg peaches instead of canned. I'm so giddy my knees tingle at the prospect! Too bad this recipe and a decent tan were the only thing I got from the Missouri game.

Chicken Pie

Since the name of this blog is "Two Cooks, One Kitchen", I guess it's time to post something from the kitchen.

I recently received a new cookbook in the mail from Pampered Chef (if you need to place a PC order let me know!). Pampered Chef paired up with stars of TLC, to put their favorite recipes into an exclusive Pampered Chef cookbook.

 I am in love with almost every recipe in the book and decided to start with Chicken Pie and of course add my touch. This recipe if from Lori Allen from Say Yes to the Dress, Atlanta.

Chicken Pie

Ingredients:

• 3 lg chicken breasts, bone in
• 1 can of cream of celery soup
• 1 1/2 cup self rising flour
• 1 1/2  cup buttermilk
• butter
• one bag frozen vegetables (this is my addition, I used H-E-B frozen soup vegetables)
• olive oil

Directions:

Cover the 3 chicken breasts with water, cover and simmer for 2 hours

Remove chicken, cool, and debone. Discard chicken bones. Reserve chicken broth

Dice chicken

Using a small amount of olive oil, sauté the frozen vegetables until tender

Add 1 1/2 cups of broth, the soup, and chicken to the pan. Bring to a boil.

Place in a rectangular dish and COOL completely.

Combine buttermilk and flour, drop on top of mixture

Place a pat of butter on top of each biscuit

Bake at 450 degrees for 45 minutes or until golden brown

This is basically a very easy chicken pot pie recipe. I boiled, deboned, and diced the chicken and made the veggie, soup, chicken mixture the night before and put it in the dish. It made very a very easy week night meal to come home and combine the buttermilk and flour and bake.

Enjoy!