Dutch Oven Apple French Toast
Bread, eggs, and apples that soak while you sleep, then bake over coals for breakfast.
- calories
- 430
- weight
- 7 oz
- cal / oz
- 61
- protein
- 10 g
- serves
- 9, scales
- prep
- 25 min
- cook
- 60 min
- total time
- 85 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Breakfast
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Vegetarian
- Nut free
- Real dishes
- Pre-mix at home
- Needs a cooler
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Granny Smith apples | 3 | tart holds shape; sweet apples turn to sauce |
|---|---|---|
| French bread | 1 loaf | day-old is better, it drinks more custard |
| Brown sugar | 1 cup | |
| Butter | 1/2 cup | |
| Cinnamon | 3 tsp | 1 tsp for the sugar, 2 tsp for the custard |
| Dried cranberries | 1/2 cup | |
| Eggs | 6 | carry in a rigid egg case |
| Milk | 1 1/2 cups | shelf-stable boxed milk works and saves cooler space |
| Vanilla | 1 tbsp |
Method
- Peel, core, and slice the apples thin. Cut the bread into 1 inch slices.
- Set the 12 inch dutch oven over a small bed of coals, low heat. Melt the butter, then stir in the brown sugar and 1 tsp cinnamon until it goes glossy.
- Pull the oven off the coals. Add the apples and cranberries, turn them through the syrup, and press the layer flat.
- Lay bread slices over the fruit, cut side up, packed edge to edge. Wedge scraps into the gaps.
- Beat the eggs, then whisk in the milk, vanilla, and the remaining 2 tsp cinnamon. Pour it evenly over the bread.
- Lid on. Let it sit at least an hour so the bread takes up the custard. Overnight in a cooler is better.
- Bake at about 350F: roughly 8 coals under the oven, 16 on the lid. Rotate the oven and the lid a quarter turn every 15 minutes.
- It is done in about an hour, when the center is set and does not wobble.
- Serve upside down so the apples and syrup land on top.
This is a bread pudding pretending to be French toast, which is why it works in camp. There is no flipping and no standing over a griddle for nine people. The bread does its own work overnight, and in the morning you are only managing coals.
The layer order matters. Butter and brown sugar go down first so they caramelize against the hot iron instead of scorching on top, and the apples sit in that syrup as a buffer between the bread and the metal. Tart apples stay in slices through an hour of heat. Rotating the oven and lid is the only real technique here — coals burn unevenly, and a quarter turn every fifteen minutes is what keeps one side from setting up black.
Packing
Measure the brown sugar and both cinnamon portions into labeled bags at home. Eggs go in a hard case, butter and milk in the cooler. Slice the bread the day before and leave it loosely bagged so it dries out.
Variations
- Swap the cranberries for raisins or chopped dried apricots.
- Boxed shelf-stable milk drops the cooler down to butter and eggs only.
- No dutch oven: build it in a foil pan, cover with foil, and set it on a grill grate over low coals.
https://www.boyscouttrail.com/content/recipe/grannys_french_toast-2424.asp