Atypical Sunday Morning

My current situation (posted up on the couch, drinking coffee and staring in amazement at the non-sunny weather outside) is unusual for my Sunday morning. However, with the hubby gone until this afternoon, church is postponed until this evening and I found myself with time to drink {extra} coffee and notice the unusual weather, picturing how great it will feel running or biking outside in a bit. No complaints here on the almost-feels-chilly 66 degrees :)

Since I've got a little time, I thought I'd share a recipe I somewhat created. By the way, I'm fighting my crazy kitten off the keyboard about every 12 seconds so if there are suddenly letters that just don't make sense, blame Rory, not me! Anyways, I was on the loveliness of Pinterest a couple weeks ago, looking for a make-ahead breakfast, and couldn't seem to find anything that didn't have 4 sticks of butter and 16 eggs in the recipe. That's a slight exaggeration, but everything really did seem unnecessarily high in calories and fat when they could have been a little lower and included some more good stuff! So after looking at basic ingredients of most, I made up my own. I made the recipe for 2, but it is easily adaptable to make for more or even a crowd. The nice part is, you make it the night before, put it in the fridge, and just pop it in the oven when you get up! If you're really motivated, you put it in the oven, go running, then come home to smell the goodness awaiting you. :) This kept me full for a good 3.5 hours, which is basically a record.

Blueberry Cinnamon French Toast Bake

Ingredients:
2 pieces whole wheat bread, torn into smallish chunks (think large bite-size)
1/4 cup blueberries (you can also add half a peach cut into pieces if you have one)
1 Tbsp. fat free strawberry cream cheese, cut into little chunks
3/4 cup 2% milk (I didn't have skim, but you can use that instead!)
1 egg white
1 Tbsp. agave nectar
cinnamon

Topping:
1 tsp. whole wheat flour
2-3 Tbsp. packed brown sugar
cinnamon
A tiny bit of melted margarine

Spray a 1.5 quart circular dish (mine is Pyrex) and spread bread chunks on the bottom. Sprinkle the blueberries (and peach) amongst the bread chunks, then add the little chunks of cream cheese amongst the bread chunks as well.

In a separate bowl, whisk the milk, egg white, agave nectar and cinnamon together and pour over the bread mixture, making sure the get all the bread chunks soaked with it! Cover with a lid or press-and-seal and put in the fridge until morning.

To make the topping, melt a tiny bit of margarine, then mix together the flour, brown sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl. Add the melted margarine to make it all stick together a bit. The topping doesn't go on until you are ready to pop the whole thing in the oven, so put the topping in a plastic baggie for the morning.

Bake
In the morning, turn the oven on to 350 degrees. Take the lid off the dish and crumble the topping all over the top. Cover the top of the dish with a piece of tin foil, and put in the oven. Set the timer for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, take off the tin foil and bake for another 20 minutes (for a total of 40 minutes baking time). Take out of the oven and enjoy warm!!

Nutrition per serving (total of 2 servings):
calories: 274
fat: 4 grams
protein: 7 grams

Well, I'm off to drink more coffee and enjoy the weather!

--KQ