Recipe: Overnight Blueberry Bagel Bake

The other day I pulled some bagels out of the freezer and to my dismay they were very stale and hard. I started to throw them away when an idea popped in to my head: “What if I created some sort of bagel bread pudding/french toast bake thing with them?” If it ended up not tasting good I was going to toss them any way, so I made up the recipe on the spot.

I’m delighted to say that this recipe turned out way yummier than I imagined, and I will definitely be making it again soon. This Overnight Blueberry Bagel Bake (try saying that 5 times fast 😀 ) is the perfect blend of french toast, blueberries, and cinnamon streusel.

With a little bit of effort the night before, you can have a super delicious breakfast and use up your extra bagels at the same time.

 

Ingredients:

Bagel base:

• 3 bagels ripped into bite-sized pieces (I used two blueberry bagels, and one cinnamon crunch, but you can use whatever plain or sweet kind of bagels you like)
• 1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries (I used fresh because that’s what I had on hand)
• 5 eggs
• 1 cup milk (I used 1 %)
• 1/2 cup half and half
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1 tbsp cinnamon
• Pinch of sea salt

Streusel topping:

• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
•  2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
• pinch of salt
• 4 tablespoons butter, cold

 

Directions for the night before:

1. Spray a 9″ pan with non stick spray.
2. Rip up bagels into bite-sized pieces and add to pan.
3. Toss blueberries on top.
4. Whisk together eggs, milk, half and half, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, and salt.
5. Pour liquid mixture over bagels and blueberries.
6. Gently press down on the bagels until the liquid soaks around (I like to call this step “smooshing it” :D)
7. Cover with plastic wrap and put in the fridge.
8. Mix together first 5 ingredients of the struesel topping, then cut in butter. Mix until the topping resembles sand or dirt. Refrigerate until morning.

Baking directions for the morning:

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Sprinkle struesel topping on top of bagel mixture.
3. Place pan in oven and bake for 35-40 minutes, or until top is brown and no liquid remains.
4. Let cool for 10 minutes, and enjoy!

 

I hope you enjoy this recipe and find it as scrumptious as we did! By the way, I suppose you could use stale bread for this recipe, but I prefer bagels as I feel like they held up better after being soaked all night. You could also use different fruit too. Nate suggested using chopped apples, which sounds delicious. If you try a different fruit, comment and let me know so we can try it out!

Also, we love getting the Tuesday baker’s dozen deal at Panera Bread. You can get any combination of 13 bagels for just $6.99. Super good deal!

-Liz