Pumpkin Chai French Toast Casserole

It's pumpkin spice season, and what better way to support your basicness than with a pumpkin chai french toast casserole? This is perfect for fancy brunch as well as kicking off a morning booked solid with apple picking or football.

The best thing about this (or one of the best because this is AMAZING) is that you assemble it the night before so all you have to do is preheat the oven and cook it. Treat yourself to a decadent, easy, and warming brunch treat like this.

The cozy flavors of pumpkin chai french toast casserole

The chai, cinnamon, and brown sugar come through more than the pumpkin, but this is still not overly sweet. Somewhere between a chai latte and cinnamon bun.

The servings are pretty large, 1/8 of a 13x9 casserole dish, but you may want to have people over to help you eat this because I ate it for breakfast, and I can't stop thinking about reheating this and eating more. I say this not being a huge pumpkin guy, but man do I love cinnamon buns.

This recipe uses Schmidt's 647 bread, which we've also used to make french toast muffins, which the kids love! Looking for an amazing brunch spread? Try our Bougie Brunch Pizza!

Find the Schmidt's bread, as well as all of the other recipe components we use on the regular on the FREE printable WW Shopping List.

Find the recipe below!

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Pumpkin Chai French Toast Casserole

This pumpkin chai french toast casserole is great for making ahead.  It will wow your guests for 

Ingredients

• 1 loaf Schmidt's 647 Italian bread if you are substituting, just know the whole loaf was 18oz and 21sp if you're doing weight watchers*
• 2/3 cup Pumpkin Puree
• 4 Vanilla Chai teabags I used Bigelow Tea
• 1/2 cup brown sugar divided
• 8 eggs
• 2 cups Unsweetened almond milk
• 1 tsp Vanilla
• 1.5ish tbsp cinnamon
• 1 pinch kosher salt

Instructions

• Heat almond milk, then steep tea bags for about 6 minutes.
• Cube the bread. Ideally, you can cube it earlier in the day and let it dry out, so it will keep it's structure better when you pour the mix in it. You can toast them in the oven for a few minutes, or just rip it apart and let it sit out for however long it takes for the almond milk to cool (which is what I did)
• Let the almond milk cool. While it is cooling, combine egg, pumpkin, 1 tbsp cinnamon, vanilla, 1/4 c of brown sugar, and salt. Once the almond milk is cool, whisk all of it together. Make sure you let it cool. If you don't, you'll scramble your eggs.
• Spray a casserole dish ( I use a 13x9) with cooking spray, add all the cubes of bread, then pour the egg mixture all over the bread. The bread will deflate, but the staler/denser the bread, the better it'll hold up.
• Sprinkle about a half of a tbsp of cinnamon and the last 1/4c of brown sugar on top. Cover and put it in the refrigerator until tomorrow morning.
• On the next morning, preheat your oven to 350 and cook uncovered for about 30-40 minutes. The French toast should not appear wet or soggy. You can do the toothpick test similar to cake; if a toothpick or fork comes out clean in the middle, it's done.
• Serve with maple syrup and basicness.

As you can see here, I left my bread in big chunks. Also, this is the tea I used.

*The bread needs to be dense. In the past, I've used challah and brioche, but I use the 647 Schmidt Italian loaf for this and it came out perfectly. If this is not available in your area, you can buy online, or you can substitute with a preferred bread.

As always, I love hearing from you guys. If you make this, or any of my other recipes, tag me on Instagram (@dwardcooks), send me a DM, and/or use the hashtag #dwardcooks.