Torrijas

Spanish Torrijas

Spanish torrijas

A very traditional Spanish sweet that could not be missed at home during Easter.

It is quite similar to French toast as we soak the bread in a milk infusion with vanilla, cinnamon, and some lemon peels. Although in Spain we add an extra touch with sugar and cinnamon at the end.

To start with the recipe you will need bread that has a good consistency like the inside of the bread. It is always better if it is from the day before,  this is because you are going to soak the bread in infused milk. You can choose a nice baguette or you can also use a white loaf cut in thick slices.

Torrijas

What do you need?

✅1 tray big enough to soak the bread 

✅ 1 saucepan or milk pan

✅ 1 bowl 

✅ 1 frying pan

Ingredients

✔ 1 baguette from the day before

✔ 2 large eggs

✔ 1.5L of whole milk

✔ 1 cinnamon stick

✔ 1 vanilla stick (without the seeds, we just need the vanilla bean)

✔ lemon or orange peel (you can choose which flavor you may prefer)

✔ 3 tbsp sugar

✔ 2 tbsp ground cinnamon

✔ olive oil to fry the bread

Method

Preparations:

• The first thing we need to do is to infuse the milk with the aromatics. 

Infused milk

Clean the lemon and cut some peel with a peeler without the white bit, which is a bit bitter. 

In a saucepan add the milk, less than 2 tbsp that you will use later, and heat till the boiling point. Then remove from the heat and introduce the lemon peels, the cinnamon stick, and the vanilla stick, and leave it aside to cool.

Lemon peel and cinnamon

You can also do this the day before and keep it in the fridge. 

Next:

• Cut the bread into slices, we want slices of 2cm thick approximately. 
• Add the infused milk into a tray, big enough to soak some bread slices at a time. 
• Beat the eggs and add the milk that we have left at the beginning.

Now we have all the preparations done and we are ready to start with the process.

Process:

• Start soaking the bread into the infused milk, turn it over, and soak each side of the bread. 
• Once they are softened pass them to the beaten egg and quickly start to fry the slices in the frying pan. I used a soft virgin olive oil to cook them but you can use any oil of your preference, vegetable or coconut oil can do too.

We should fry the slices and turn them so they are brown on both sides. Set another tray with kitchen paper to leave the bread so it doesn't get oily.

• In another deep plate or bowl mix the sugar with the cinnamon. Coat the bread slices with the sugar and cinnamon mixture in both sides. 
• Do this with all the bread and it will be ready to eat!

Happy Easter and enjoy!

Torrijas