French Toast with Plum Compote

I discovered this recipe when watching old repeats of Nigella Kitchen. As it’s great as a weekend breakfast / brunch and requires minimal effort (so is perfect if you’re soothing a sore head from the night before), I have to share it with you. It’s also a great way of using up stale bread, so there’s less waste!

Preparation time: 5-10 minutes

Cooking time: 15 minutes

Ingredients: 

For the plum compote:

• 250ml Cranberry juice
• 100g caster sugar
• 500g plums
• 1 stick of Cinnamon

For the French toast:

• 4 thick slices of white bread (I had brioche, but any will do)
• 2 eggs
• 60ml of milk (ideally full fat, but use whatever you’ve got in your fridge)
• 1 tbsp caster sugar
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• a couple of knobs of butter (for the frying)

(This mixture makes enough for about 4 slices of French toast, but if you need/want more, just multiple up the quantities).

Recipe:

1. Pour in the cranberry juice and sugar into a wide saucepan and give a quick stir (before you put it on the heat) to help the sugar to start to dissolve. Then place over a medium-low heat until the sugar has completely dissolved.
2. Whilst you’re waiting for the sugar to dissolve, halve the plums. You can leave the stones in for now, as they’ll fall away very easily after they’re cooked. Why waste unnecessary effort if you’ve got a sore head?
3. Once the sugar is dissolved, add the cinnamon stick and whack up the heat to high and leave to bubble away for a couple of minutes until the liquid becomes syrupy. Then add the plums, cut-side down (so the skins are showing) and leave to simmer for about 10 minutes. It will take less time if you’re using ripe fruit (as opposed to the billiard balls I had).
4. Once the plums are soft and have oozed their juices into the syrup, set aside and keep warm.
5. For the french toast, whisk together the eggs, milk, ground cinnamon and caster sugar in a wide bowl (large enough to put the slices of bread in).
6. Put a knob of butter in a frying pan over a medium heat. Whilst it’s melting, push a couple of slices of the bread into the egg mixture on both sides until the bread is soaked but still holds its shape.
7. Transfer to the frying pan and fry for a couple of minutes either side in the butter until golden brown on each side, but so that you can still feel a nice wobble inside it.
8. Serve immediately (who would want to wait?) with the plum compote.