Toffee Apple French Toast

The local newspaper has a "Cookbook Corner" where a few times a week the author will post a recipe. I have not been impressed with the recipes thus far. The author posts things such as: Creamed Eggs, Old-Time Tuna Bake, Savory Pea Soup with Sausage - things that just don't sound appealing, EVER.
Then, one day, the author posted Toffee Apple French Toast. Now, I am not a lover of French Toast. In fact, I don't like it at all. But I like Toffee and I usually like apples. Now ED on the other hand LOVES French Toast and always wants to make it. So, when I saw this recipe, I decided it would be a good compromise. The only problem with it was that it took WAY longer to cook than 35-45 minutes, even though I halved the recipe. And it isn't a very aesthetically pleasing dish, but it tasted all right, as good as any French Toast can ever taste, I suppose.

Toffee Apple French Toast

• 8 cups cubed French bread (1-inch cubes)

• 2 medium tart apples, peeled and chopped

• 1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened

• 3/4 cup packed brown sugar

• 1/4 cup sugar

• 1 3/4 cups milk, divided

• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract, divided

• 1/2 cup English toffee bits or almond brickle chips

• 5 eggs

Place half of the bread cubes in a greased 13 x 9 x 2-inch baking dish; top with apples. In a mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese, sugars, 1/4 cup milk, and 1 teaspoon vanilla until smooth; stir in toffee bits. Spread over apples. Top with remaining bread cubes. In another mixing bowl, beat the eggs and remaining milk and vanilla; pour over bread. Cover and refrigerate over night.Remove from the refrigerator 30 minutes before baking. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees for 35 to 45 minutes or until a knife inserted near the center comes out clean.

Bubble Ring

During the summer EC and I went and picked mountains of blackberries, some of which I turned into jam. I then put the jam into Ziplock bags and stuck them in the freezer. Sounds like a good idea, right? Wrong. Somehow the jam leaked through the bag seal and I was left with sticky jam all over the bottom of my freezer. On the positive side, the leaks were slow leaks, so there wasn't too much jam, but there was still enough that it was gross. And I still had a lot of jam. So I started making this Black Raspberry Bubble Ring Breakfast thingy, substituting Blackberry jam for the Black Raspberry Jam. It takes a little bit of time, but it lasts EC and I a whole week, so for a blessed week we don't have to worry about what to have for breakfast, but we have to eat the same thing every day, so there are some draw backs.

I still haven't quite figured out the syrup. Are you supposed to pour it on while the bread is in the pan, thus letting it soak into the bread? But that sounds like it would turn the bread all soggy, so I pour it over it on the first morning, and it forms a kind of lake around the Bubble Ring, so I am thinking this isn't quite right either, but it tastes fine, so whatev.

Black Raspberry Bubble Ring

From Taste of Home

Ingredients:
1 package (1/4 ounce) active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water (110° to 115°)
1 cup warm milk (110° to 115°)
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar, divided
1/2 cup butter, melted, divided
1 egg
1 teaspoon salt
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 jar (10 ounces) seedless black raspberry preserves ( I use Blackberry Jam, with seeds)

SYRUP:
1/3 cup corn syrup
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions: In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Add the milk, 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup butter, egg, salt and 3-1/2 cups flour. Beat until smooth. Stir in enough remaining flour to form a soft dough. Turn onto a floured surface; knead until smooth and elastic, about 6-8 minutes. Place in a greased bowl, turning once to grease top. Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about 1-1/4 hours. Punch dough down. Turn onto a lightly floured surface; divide into 32 pieces. Flatten each into a 3-in. disk. Place about 1 teaspoon of preserves on the center of each piece; bring edges together and seal. Place 16 dough balls in a greased 10-in. fluted tube pan. Brush with half of the remaining butter; sprinkle with 1 tablespoon sugar. Top with remaining balls, butter and sugar. Cover and let rise until doubled, about 35 minutes. Bake at 350° for 25-30 minutes or until golden brown. Combine syrup ingredients; pour over warm bread. Cool for 5 minutes before inverting onto a serving plate. Yield: 1 loaf.

Mazurkas

This past summer our friends took us to their sweet blackberry picking spot and EC and I went blackberry crazy! We ended up going out there to pick blackberries three times and ended up with gallons of blackberries, no joke. So with a freezer full of blackberries, I set out to find blackberry recipes, like my tart. The same friends who showed us the blackberry pickin' spot also gave me a recipe for Mazurkas.
I had never heard/seen/tasted Mazurkas before, and I lost the recipe a couple of times, so it has taken me quite a while to get around to cooking them. But once I did, I can honestly say they are the best looking Mazurkas I have ever seen, and also the best tasting.

We thought they were going to be a treat, since it has 3 cups of brown sugar in them, but it turns out that it also has 3 1/2 cups of whole wheat flour in them, so they aren't sweet at all, so we eat them for breakfast. However, it is a possibility that to the normal person they are sweet and my tolerance for sweet things has increased greatly in these past few months. Interesting thought. Either way, we still will be eating them for breakfast because they made A LOT and we are still trying to get through them.

No recipe for these, because I haven't gotten permission from my friend to post it, so if you want the recipe, you will have to talk to her.

Snickerdoodle Muffins

I saw this recipe for Snickerdoodle muffins and decided that I needed to try it. Not because I have any problem with eating cookies for breakfast, but because if it is in a muffin form, I will feel slightly less guilty about it. They were pretty good, but it has been a while since I had an actual Snickerdoodle cookie, so I can't remember if the muffins are close to what the actual cookie tastes like. I think what I need to do is make these muffins AND the cookies and then eat them at the same time, to compare and contrast - for breakfast of course.

.

Snickerdoodle Muffins

(From Culinary Concoctions by Peabody)

.

2 sticks unsalted butter

1 cup sugar

2 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

¾ tsp baking soda

¾ tsp baking powder

¾ tsp cream of tarter

¾ tsp freshly grated nutmeg

1 and ¼ cup sour cream

2 and ¼ cups all purpose flour

1 cup sugar and 2 TBSP cinnamon mixed together for rolling

1.Cream the butter and sugar until soft about 3 to 5 minutes. Add in the vanilla. Add in the eggs one at a time and mix until each is incorporated.

2.In a separate, mix together the flour, baking soda, and baking powder and cream of tarter.

3.Add the flour mixture and the sour cream alternately to the egg-butter mixture in the additions. Start with the flour and end with the flour. Scrape the bowl occasionally.

4. Using an ice cream scoop, scoop out muffin batter one at a time and drop into a shallow bowl filled with the cinnamon sugar mixture. Roll the muffin around in the mixture until it is covered completely in cinnamon sugar. Place muffin in to muffin tin.. Depending on the size of your tins, you should get about 12 to 14 muffins. Bake them for approx. 20-22 minutes in a 350F oven or until they are golden brown.