Peanut Butter Banana Stuffed French Toast

Peanut Butter Banana Stuffed French Toast

Before Josh and I were married I had never made french toast. Actually after we were married I would use it as an excuse to get him to make breakfast whenever we were craving it (or I just didn't want to cook!)! It seemed like such a difficult thing to me for some reason. I'm a rule follower kind of person so to not have a recipe made it seem like such an impossibility. As I learned how to let go and let cooking become an art I realized that I could do much more without a recipe than I ever thought.

Either way, french toast isn't very difficult at all. I don't know why I was so scared of it. Last week I saw a post somewhere about a grilled peanut butter and banana sandwich, which to me seemed like DUH! We eat peanut butter banana toast at least 3 times a week around here. I had to figure out how to make that better, more weekend appropriate, glam it up so to speak. Well, here you have it: Peanut Butter Banana French Toast with Honey Drizzle. So unfancy. So good!

I was going to make pancakes on Friday, but this sounded so much more appetizing. It was just as easy and rather quick once the sandwiches were made. I added a little cinnamon to the eggs and it was perfect.

Peanut Butter Banana French Toast
8 slices Whole Wheat Bread
4 Tbsp Creamy Peanut Butter
1 Banana
3 Eggs (you can use just egg whites if you want to save a few calories, but you'll need more eggs)
Cinnamon
Butter
Honey

First, prepare your eggs. I use a square pyrex dish. Crack the eggs in, sprinkle with cinnamon, (as much or as little as you like, you really can't go wrong!) and scramble them up. Heat a large skillet or griddle on medium heat.

Meanwhile, on a plate or cutting board assemble your sandwiches. I used about a tablespoon of peanut butter per sandwich, but it's up to you how much you like. I didn't want mine oozing out while I was cooking so I spread it thin, a little on each slice of bread. Next, slice the banana onto one slice of bread with peanut butter. I'm a little anal about having thin slices and lining them up just so. You'll probably only use about 1/4 of a medium banana.

Close each sandwich and press the edges together to decrease the chance of anything flying out when you flip it. You can do this to each sandwich right before you place it into the eggs. You may want more or fewer banana slices, but really they're just there to enhance the flavor, not be the flavor. Go ahead and place the sandwich into the egg mixture. Move it around to coat, then flip and do the same on the other side. When you're ready to cook, drop a good sized pat of butter onto your griddle or skillet. If it melts and foams up immediately you've got the right temperature. If it browns really fast, turn the heat down just a bit. Spread it around to coat the cooking surface. Remember you're going to flip the sandwich and you want there to be enough butter so it doesn't stick or burn. I used a stainless steel griddle so I needed more butter than if I had used, say, a non-stick skillet.

Next, put the sandwich onto the griddle or skillet right in the butter. Let it cook for a minute or two. The goal here is to cook the egg and warm the sandwich. You want it to be browned and crisp on the outside and ooey and gooey on the inside. Once it starts to brown flip it over carefully. Press down on the edges and let it cook for another minute, until it's browned on the second side.

Serve it up! I drizzled honey over mine. Then we added a drizzle of real maple syrup. Then I added honey roasted almond slivers from Trader Joe's. Sorry I don't have a picture of all of that. I ate it too fast!  Josh had his with just syrup. And you can have yours however you like too!