I love recipes that make it easy to serve a bunch of people with minimal effort. A slow cooker is usually a go-to for those types of recipes but I’ve never considered using it to make breakfast before. The Ninja Cooking System is the perfect tool for it though. They sent over this recipe for an Apple French Toast Casserole and I couldn’t wait for the weekend to come so I could make it.

This recipe makes 8 servings so it would be great for breakfast for a larger group but I also packed up the rest of my servings to reheat during the week.

Ingredients:

• ½ cup butter
• 2 Granny Smith apples, cored and chopped
• 1/2 cup chopped pecans
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
• ½ cup packed brown sugar
• ½ cup pure maple syrup
• 1 loaf challah bread (about 1 pound), cut into cubes
• 6 large eggs
• 2 cups vanilla almond milk (or normal milk)
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• Pinch salt
• Confectioners’ sugar

If you have a Ninja Cooking System, you can making most of this recipe right in the pot. I will include directions to make this is in a normal slow cooker as well.

If using a Ninja Cooking System, add butter to the pot and set to Stovetop High. Heat until butter is melted. Add apples, pecans, walnuts, brown sugar, and syrup to the pot. (I was apparently supposed to peel the apples. Annnd I didn’t. Oh well.)

Cook for 10 minutes or until apples are tender, stirring often.

If using a normal slow cooker, melt the butter in a medium saute pan on your oven top. Cook the apples, pecans, walnuts, brown sugar, and syrup in the saute pan for 10 minutes, stirring often. Add the apple mixture to your slow cooker.

Add the bread to a large bowl.

In a medium sized bowl, combine the eggs, milk, cinnamon, vanilla extract, and salt.

Pour the egg mixture over the bread and stir to coat.

Add the bread mixture to the slow cooker and stir.

Cook on high for 2-3 hours (I cooked mine for 3).

Sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar.  If desired, drizzle some additional maple syrup on top.

My goodness this was fantastic. The best part is that I was able to add everything to the slow cooker, leave and run some errands, and come back to a delicious breakfast!

I had some worry that this would end up kind of mushy. But it really wasn’t! This ends up being kind of a mix between French Toast and Bread Pudding.

I added some slices of bananas on top. I’d suggest adding a fruit of your choice.

Please consider voting for me (Kaitlin Lunny) as Philly’s Epikur Writer of the Year Award.