As a general rule, when there is buttermilk in the fridge, I make biscuits for myself as a rare treat. Having filled the request of some buttermilk-ranch dressing for jar-salad lunches, I still had plenty of buttermilk left on hand. So one morning when everyone was off at work or camp, I decided to make myself some biscuits for breakfast. (What can I say? I’m a horrible person who doesn’t like to share their biscuits.) As I walked into the kitchen I saw a few lonely, older slices of “Dad’s Bread” from Rosalind Bakery and thought to myself, “I should really use those for French Toast.” Then the idea hit me to use the buttermilk for the french toast. A quick search of the web proved it was not an original idea, but I’m OK with that. The premise was as simple as switching buttermilk for the regular milk in the batter.

Why had I not thought of this before? Well, when it comes to french toast I tend to be a traditionalist, probably because it was the first thing I learned how to cook at the age of six. (Thanks, Mom! Also, according to Mom, my first words were “hot stove.” Is it a wonder I ended up here?) Usually, my go-to bread for french toast is challah, but I really didn’t want the Dad’s Bread to go to waste. After all, the French term for “French Toast” is Pan Perdu, literally “rescued bread”.

As I was adding vanilla to the batter, my eyes caught sight of a bottle of bourbon sitting on the counter, so I decided to add a bit of that to the batter as well. The result was a tangy delight, with just enough bourbon flavor coming through, but not enough to make it “boozy”. The batter is very thick compared to the traditional one made with regular milk, so I decided to try a batch with a blend of regular and buttermilk. The first batch didn’t brown as well as I had hoped and I thought thinning it out a bit might help. Turns out the secret was not in the milks, but using a bit more butter than I usually do. My son discovered this as he was making himself a batch, and he heaped butter on the griddle. He also helped with the food styling and pouring of syrup during the photo shoot.

After tasting both batches, I think the all-buttermilk version definitely gives it a better punch of flavor. I usually don’t put maple syrup on my french toast, but  a little bit nicely balances the tang of the buttermilk and  plays very nicely with the vanilla and bourbon. Next time I might go wild and try using challah in the buttermilk batter!