French Toast with Cinnamon Apples

Bulgaria's food scene is changing as fast as you can say "Subway." As one of my students recently wrote in a poem, "I used to smell Bulgarian food everywhere / Now I never do." Each week when Brett and I head for the grocery store we find something new. The most recent delivery (just this week) was maple syrup all the way from Canada. But at 20 leva for a tiny bottle, it's still a hot commodity. Kind of like gold. So I'll continue my pattern of the last two years and top my pancakes and French toast with fruit.

Strawberries, raspberries, or mixed berries all cook up in about 10 minutes with a bit of water and sugar, but in the end, my favorite is Cinnamon Apples. Since I discovered I could make my own apple sauce with nothing but a pan, an apple, some sugar, and eight minutes, I've been doing it pretty regularly. Hot steamy apples compliment cinnamon French toast beautifully, and the whole operation is quick enough for me to do when I run home for lunch between classes.

Cinnamon-Apple Topping

Water

Two Green Apples, peeled, cored, and sliced

1/8-1/4 cup sugar (depends on you)

1 tsp cinnamon

Fill a small saucepan with an inch and a half (or so) of water. Add prepared green apples, sugar and cinnamon and stir. Cook over high heat, uncovered, while you make your French toast (8-10 minutes or until it is as soft as you want it). If it begins to boil too hard, just turn it down a notch.

Cinnamon French Toast for Two

Four slices firm white bread

Two eggs

1/8 cup milk

1/2 tsp cinnamon

Butter for the Pan

Heat a frying pan over medium high heat (I used level 10 on a scale of 12). Coat thinly with butter.

Mix milk, eggs, and cinnamon with a fork until combined.

Drop bread, one slice at a time, into mixture and let soak for a second. Flip. Soak.

Add eggy bread to pan, keeping well over on one side. Repeat with another slice of bread and place it on the other side. I found it took about two and a half minutes to brown the French toast to golden, but check every so often to be sure it doesn't burn. Flip. The other side doesn't take as long to cook, so start checking after a minute.

Plate and top with hot cinnamon apples.

Want to try other unique flavors of French toast?

Check out Cinnamon Nutmeg French Toast with Berries at Baking and Books or Apple Gruyere French Toast at Serious Eats.

This simple Pumpkin Butter from All Recipes is also a great French Toast topping.