Blueberry French Toast Bake

1 loaf French Bread, cubed (if you have an egg bread like challa, even better)
1 pound Cream Cheese, cubed
1 cup Blueberries
12 Eggs
1/3 cup Maple Syrup
2 cups Milk

1. Butter a 9x13-inch baking dish. A lighter color works best for this recipe. Cut the bread into 1 1/2-inch cubes. Cut the cream cheese into 1-inch cubes. Layer the bread cubes and cream cheese cubes in two layers in the bottom of the dish, with the bread on the bottom. Pour the blueberries over top.

2. In a large bowl, beat the eggs, add the maple syrup and milk. Pour over the bread mixture and cover loosely with foil. Place dish in refrigerator with weights.

3. Refrigerate overnight or at least 3 to 4 hours.

4. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Reposition foil so that dish is tightly covered. Bake for 30 minutes covered, then uncover and bake for an additional 30 minutes, check at this time, it may take up to 40 minutes without the foil.

Blueberry Syrup
1 cup Sugar
2 tbs Cornstarch
1 cup Cold Water
1 tbs Unsalted Butter
1 cup Blueberries

Stir sugar, cornstarch and water over high heat in a saucepan. Add butter and blueberries and cook until the blueberries pop. Serve warm over French Toast Bake.

Notes
Cream cheese is normally sold in 8 oz blocks, so make sure that you get two. It will look like a lot of cream cheese when it is all in the pan. I’m too cheap to use maple syrup in this; regular pancake syrup works fine. To weight the dish, you can use another 9x13-inch dish placed on top, adding cans or whatever you can find to fit inside, just make sure it's even. If you don’t use another dish, just make sure that it is equally weighted. Be careful though, this easily overflows. Don’t skip this step, otherwise you will have some parts that don’t get any egg mix and will burn. Other parts will be too saturated with egg mix to cook thoroughly. With the syrup, be sure that the cornstarch and water are thoroughly mixed before heating, lumpy syrup is just as gross as lumpy gravy. This dish will serve 8-12.