Torrijas, A Delicious Sweet That Is Great To Eat Any Time Of The Day

Torrijas, a delicious Spanish sweet that is great to eat any time of the day, but is especially popular for breakfast! It is a very old dish that is eaten during Lent and is said to have originated in the South of Spain to make use of stale bread. There are many variations of torrijas, but the two most common are topped with cinnamon and sugar or drizzled with honey.

This “sweet” is traditionally eaten during Lent, the 40-day period before Easter. It is believed that torrijas originated in Andalucian convents during the XV century as a way to use up stale bread. Although today it is associated with the cuisine of Madrid, it is a popular breakfast food all over. The British might call torrijas bread pudding, while the Americans would probably see it as a Spanish variation of “French Toast.”
　　
Although torrijas are a popular breakfast food, they can be eaten any time of the day. There are many variations of this treat – some soften the bread by soaking it in wine, while other variations use milk or water and honey. In Spain, the typical bread would be a French-style baguette, but today pan de molde or white bread, such as Wonder bread can be used. Most variations serve it with sugar and cinnamon.
　　 
Ingredients
　　
4-6 Slices of Stale White Bread
　　
3/4 cup Milk
　　
1 Egg
　　
Vegetable Oil for frying, such as Canola or Corn Oil, NOT olive oil
　　
1/8 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
　　
Sugar and Cinnamon
　　
Honey
　　
Serves Four.
　　
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
　　
One important thing to take in account when you want to make torrijas is that you have to use one day old bread, yes yesterday´s bread. If you use fresh bread it will not absorb enough milk and you will get low quality torrijas.
　　
You have to prepare in a big pot milk with sugar to bathe the bread.
　　
Use a lot of sugar to make sweet torrijas.
　　
Some people use red wine or white wine in this point instead milk, the arecalled "torrijas borrachas" (drunk trorrijas).
　　
You have to cut a big slices of bread. When you have the sliced bread, then you put it on a big plate and pour the prepared milk.
　　
Let the torrijas drain the milk.
　　
The syrup is made with water, sugar and lemon juice, lemon and orange skin and one stick of cinnamon.
　　
Boil the water with sugar, juice from a lemon, and one lemon skin and orange skin.
　　
Add the cinnamon stick if you like.
　　
Yo can do this while you are frying the bread slices.
　　
Put the fried torrijas into a tray and pour the syrup in it, the torrijas will drain the syrup and in a few hours they will be ready to be eaten.