Green Tea French Toast came about when I was faced with a limited palette of ingredients in a Japanese hostel’s well equipped kitchen and wanted something homey but still foreign for brunch.
The hostel, the
Emblem in Kanazawa, Japan, had a large and well equipped kitchen and a nice seating area. I had bread, butter, eggs, and milk. The hostel provided sugar and salt. All well and good, I could make perfectly good but possibly bland pain perdu with those ingredients, but my custardary, rich take called out for some flavoring agent. At home I’d use cinnamon and vanilla or orange zest. They were not in my larder here, so to speak. What I did have was fresh ginger and a green tea bag. The bag was matcha (powdered green tea) mixed with finely ground green tea. Doing this again, I would use all matcha tea, but the combo worked well for flavoring the custard. I only had enough day-old baguette to make two generous servings with a taste for the curious hostel staff. Usually I serve my French toast with a choice of maple syrup, jam and or yogurt, here I just skipped the toppings, but if you have them, they would work well. I think it would also be nice with a ginger syrup and whipped cream.
For my traditional French Toast recipe which uses challah, vanilla and cinammon, please click
here.
Green Tea French Toast
Serves 2-3
½ cup milk
1 matcha and green tea bag (matcha mixed with green tea) or 1 tsp. powdered matcha
2 Tbs. sugar
1 large egg
⅛ tsp. salt
½ tsp. grated fresh ginger
About 10 slices day-old baguette, sliced 1” thick (about 90 grams)
1 Tbs. butter for frying, plus more as needed
Extra sugar or powdered sugar for garnish, as desired
Green tea or matcha for garnish, if available and as desired
Simmer milk (do not boil). Remove from heat once simmering. Add tea bag (or mix in matcha). Let steep until cool. Remove tea bag if using, pressing on it with a spoon to make sure all the liquid returns to the pot. (If using all matcha, stir to make sure it is fully dissolved.)
Beat together sugar, egg, salt and ginger. Slowly pour in the milk, beating constantly, until well mixed. Place bread slices in a rimmed dish, pour milk mixture over bread, covering completely. Let stand, turning slices over occasionally, about 5-10 minutes until custard is mostly absorbed by the bread.
Heat butter over medium heat until sizzling. Fry slices until browned on one side then flip and fry other side until browned, working in batches if need be. Sprinkle tops of finished French toast with sugar or powdered sugar if desired. Sprinkle with additional 1 tsp. matcha or tear open a fresh green tea bag and crumble some of the tea to a fine dust and garnish with about a teaspoon of that.
