The 1-Ingredient Upgrade for Better French Toast

It’s Saturday morning, you’re in your bathrobe, and you’re craving French toast. It’s quick and comforting yet still makes breakfast special. 

Maybe you’re ready for a change of pace that’ll punch your French toast up from average to extraordinary. You can make French toast worthy of serving at a bed and breakfast by simply adding a single ingredient that you may already have handy in your home bar: Triple Sec.

An Idea From a Classic Cookbook 

Over 12 million cooks have made Simply Recipes’ French toast. In it, our site’s founder Elise Bauer reveals her secret to memorable French toast. It’s booze.

Here’s what Elise writes in the recipe: “One of my favorite variations, the idea for which I picked up from The Silver Palate Cookbook 20-some odd years ago, is to add some orange zest and a bit of Triple Sec orange liqueur to the batter for extra zing.” 

Elise originally published her recipe in 2005, so if you do the math, you can see how time-tested this tip is. What’s especially great is that you may not always have an orange around to zest, but cocktail lovers likely have a bottle of Triple Sec sitting in their cupboard. And liqueur never goes bad. With one bottle, you can make French toast for years!

In a comment, a reader named David sums it up: “Wow the Triple Sec was amazing!!! Everyone couldn't resist it. I had to make a second batch. Thanks for the awesome and delicious recipe.”

How Much Triple Sec To Add

Our French toast recipe calls for 4 eggs and 1/4 cup of Triple Sec, so if you’re making a smaller batch of French toast, that translates to 1 tablespoon of Triple Sec per egg.

Other Liqueurs To Try

Maybe you don’t have Triple Sec, but you have a bottle of another orange liqueur, such as Grand Marnier or Cointreau. No problem! Use that instead.  

You can raid the liquor cabinet to experiment with other flavors. Here are a few ideas:

• Irish cream, such as Bailey’s
• Frangelico
• Apple brandy
• Amaretto
• Coffee liqueur, such as Kahlúa

One brave reader named Jacob left this comment: “We used blue Curaçao for the Triple Sec and ended up with a delicious ‘green eggs and ham’ effect.” I’d recommend this variation for adventurous/freewheeling cooks only.

What If You Don’t Drink?

The trick of adding orange juice to the royale for French toast is as old as the hills! I’d beat it with the eggs before adding the milk, to prevent the acid in the orange juice from curdling the milk.