Creme Brûlée Banana French Toast Bake

“Heaven, I’m in heaven….” Yes that is what you’ll be singing after you take your first bite of this sinfully delicious Creme Brûlée Banana French Toast Bake!!! With a sweet creme brûlée “crust” layer, sautéed bananas and a rich custard… does’t get much better then that!!! This is not figure friendly at all but in my opinion, you NEED to indulge once in a while and this is the perfect thing to indulge in!!!

Yesterday I took a trip to the fabulous Delicious Orchards in Colts Neck and amongst other yummy things I picked up a couple loaves of gorgeous challah bread! So I invited the family over for a little Sunday breakfast! Now, me being me, I couldn’t serve just regular sliced french toast so I came up with this and WOW!!!!! Everyone LOVED this and it has certainly landed itself on my keepers list!

There are a few components to this but trust me, it is soooo worth it! Lets get to it shall we…

3 Tbsp butter

5 bananas, sliced

1/4 cup amaretto

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1 stick butter

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 Tbsp light corn syrup

1/2 tsp vanilla

1 pint light cream

6 eggs

3/4 cup sweetened condensed milk

3/4 cup milk

2 tsp vanilla

2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. I used a 13 x 9 baking pan for this recipe.

Lets start with the boozed bananas and while they are cooking start the “crust”. In a large non stick sauté pan over medium low heat, melt the butter, brown sugar and cinnamon. Whisk until combined and then add in the bananas. Mix to coat then add the amaretto and allow the mixture to simmer for for approx 5-8 minutes until the alcohol is evaporated and the sauce is thickened. Set aside.

For the crust, to a small saucepan, add the butter, brown sugar, corn syrup and vanilla. Continually mix while everything is melting together to prevent the sugar from burning. You want to allow it to simmer for about 5 minutes. The mixture will darken in color. Immediately pour the mixture into the bottom of the baking pan, it will begin to harden slightly.

Now the rich custard… In a bowl whisk together all of the ingredients.

To assemble, place a layer of the sliced bread overtop the “crust”. Pour 1/3 of the custard over the bread. Next add another layer of bread and the bananas on top of that. Again pour over 1/3 of the custard. Add the final layer of bread and remaining custard. Sprinkle the entire thing with cinnamon.

Bake in the oven for about 35-40 minutes or until the custard is set. Now the fun part… find a platter large enough to fit this gorgeous french toast bake. Place the platter on top of the baking pan and flip it over so the bake falls out onto the platter revealing that wonderful crust…. HEAVEN!!!