Why you should ALWAYS have maple syrup in your pantry

I love breakfast. It has to be my favorite meal of the day. I never miss it. Thursdays I am home and it is the one day I can go beyond my usual kibble and milk and explore the kind of breakfast opportunities that are usually reserved for the weekends.

See, the huz doesn't do breakfast. It's not his thing. His idea of breakfast is an iced venti skinny vanilla latte with a blueberry scone chaser. Therefore Thursday is my day to play with my breakfast food.

Today I decided I wanted french toast. The only problem was that I didn't have any syrup. I got resourceful. I scoured my pantry and refrigerator.   Surely there has to be SOMETHING I can use on french toast.

Then it came to me. You see I have this very vague memory of one of my childhood friends introducing me to the virtue of toasted bread with peanut butter. The pis de resistance was taking the toast, tearing it into bite size pieces, then dipping it in corn syrup. Yes - corn syrup. I swear I thought this was the coolest thing ever, in my ten year old brain.  There must be a way to replicate this deliciously sweet concept, into more modern version for breakfast. I was wrong.

They look soooo cute together. Don't fall for it. They lie.

I proceeded to make my french toast as I normally do, with one exception. I had an epiphany this morning because I do not have the largest non-stick skillet in the world. I thought why not cut the bread in half, then there would be a little more room, and would make flipping that much easier - like so:

These three ARE cute, and they live up to their promises.

So while my toast was frenching in the skillet I decided to make my "syrup." I combined two tablespoons of corn syrup, and a heaping tablespoon of peanut butter. It was thick. Like mortar thick. Not syrup. Just thick.  So I decided to add a tablespoon of hot water, which definitely thinned it out. This is how it looked:

Isn't this what they use for paper mache?

See it doesn't even LOOK appetizing. It's just brown, liquidy, peanut tasting, blah. Not good, and certainly not going anywhere near my beautiful, golden, buttery french toast.

Now because I tend to be an enabler, I can defend the corn syrup and peanut butter a little bit.  I mean I don't know why I thought peanut butter would be a good substitute for maple syrup.  They are two completely different flavors, and since my brain was craving maple and my taste buds received peanut, I'm sure my stomach said "WTF, Shawn. What did I do to you this morning?"  Needless to say my "syrup" went down the drain.

In came Plan B - strawberry jam. Again, strawberries and maple - two completely different flavors - but somehow the jam did it for me. It worked. I diluted the jam with a touch of boiling water because I'm a dipper, and all I can say was breakfast was saved. 


Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.