Foodie Friday

Happy New Year!

I hope you all had a wonderful New Years celebration with lots of great company and great food!  

The last couple of years my husband has been working so the kids and I have travelled to my parents' house to celebrate there.  This year we mixed it up a bit.  My husband still had to work (that's one of the perks of being a police officer) but instead of us going to my parents' house I asked them the come here.  

I had heard about the Toronto Zoo having a celebration and thought it might be fun to check it out.  It was put on for kids so the entertainment included a magician, fun music and an appearance by Po from Kung fu Panda.  We got to see lots of animals up close and a few of the highlights included seeing a year old polar bear cub, having reindeer walk past us and hearing the arctic wolves howl.  The howling was pretty amazing! 

Since the festivities were mainly for kids the countdown ended at 8pm.  That gave us plenty of time to travel home safely, get the kids to bed and watch the parties taking place in other parts of the Country on TV.  The last couple of years we haven't managed to stay up past 11pm but this year we went to bed at close to 1am!

So, I was very glad that I had thought to have a special breakfast prepared for us for the following morning.  I found this recipe at Kraft Canada and thought I'd give it a try. I like to try new things and this one sounded right up our alley.

Most of the work was done New Year's Eve and then all I had to do was pop it in the oven in the morning, cut up some strawberries, serve with real Canadian maple syrup and we were ready to have a breakfast feast!  It went over very well with the adults but the boys didn't seem to like the taste of it very much. I think it was the cream cheese filling.  

Leaving B and K out of it I will definitely be making this again, and maybe even sooner than next New Years Day.  I might add a little cinnamon to the cream cheese and try cutting off the crust but otherwise I wouldn't change anything else.

Picture from Kraft Canada

Overnight Stuffed French Toast

1 tub (250 g) Philadelphia Light Cream Cheese Spread

3 Tbsp. sugar

8 slices cinnamon-raisin bread

4 eggs

1/2 cup milk

2 cups sliced fresh strawberries

1 cup blueberries

MIX cream cheese spread and sugar until well blended; spread onto bread. Place 4 bread slices, cream cheese-sides up, in 8-inch square baking dish sprayed with cooking spray. Cover with remaining bread slices, cream cheese-sides down.

WHISK eggs and milk until well blended; pour over bread. Refrigerate overnight.

HEAT oven to 350ºF. Bake, uncovered, 30 to 35 min. or until centre is set and top is lightly browned. Serve topped with fruit and maple syrup.

It really is that easy!

It claims to feed 8 people and that is accurate if everyone has half a portion accompanied with berries and syrup.  We were comfortably full afterwards.

I recommend letting the cream cheese soften first before trying to blend with the sugar (and cinnamon if you add it).  I also recommend serving with the fresh berries and maple syrup.  It was a very tasty combination!

I'm sorry I don't have pictures of the french toast I made!  I'm still not used to taking pictures of every food item I make or eat.  It doesn't come naturally and by the time I thought about it we'd eaten it all up! When I make it again I will try to remember to take a picture.

Enjoy!!