Baked Toffee Apple French Toast

The flavors of this dish were so unique!  Who knew that apples, cream cheese, vanilla, chocolate, and toffee would all taste so delicious together??  I found this recipe at Betterrecipes.com, but I modified it a little to make it better (candy bar used, type of milk, type of apples, and bread cube size).  I was really skeptical before making it because there were no reviews and I had no idea if I was going to like apples and cream cheese and chocolate mixed together, but I definitely did!  The flavors blend perfectly together, and there's just the right amount of each ingredient.  The richness of the cream cheese and vanilla, combined with the slight tartness of the apples, with a slight burst of chocolate toffee was so amazing...and smells heavenly while baking.  The inside is super moist and comforting, and the very top is wonderfully crunchy.  The only change I may make next time I make it is to add a cinnamon brown sugar topping because some of the bread cubes sticking up at the top would have been really tasty with a sweet, crunchy, topping.  But it totally isn't necessary.  I would also love to try this with white chocolate chips instead of the heath bar..or just adding white chocolate chips to the heath bar.  I highly recommend serving this warm with whipped cream, and it's also very tasty chilled after sitting in the refrigerator.


Ingredients:

8 cups	Cubed or torn French Bread, about 1" cubes
2	Medium apples, peeled and chopped
1 pkg	(8 Ounces) Cream Cheese, softened
¾ cup	Packed Brown Sugar
¼ cup	White Sugar
1¾ cups	Whole Milk
2 tsp	Vanilla Extract, divided
½ cup	English Toffee Bits (such as Heath Bar)
5	Eggs

DIRECTIONS:

Place half of the bread cubes in a greased 13-in. x 9-in. baking dish; top with apples. In a large 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 bowl, beat the eggs and remaining milk and vanilla until blended; pour over bread. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Remove from the refrigerator 30 minutes before baking. Bake, uncovered, at 350F for 35-45 minutes or until a knife inserted near the center comes out clean.

Chocolate Gingerbread Toffee Cake

This may be the best cake I've ever had.  I made this for Christmas dessert yesterday, and it is absolutely outstanding. Oh..and just a warning: it makes a very large cake.  There's only 3 people in my family, and we've probably cut about 10 slices out of it, and there's still over half a cake left. I guess it's because it's 3 layers instead of the usual two. We even freezed some of it to save for the future, since we didn't want it to go bad. It took some time to prepare, but it was TOTALLY worth it...and lots of fun to make. This was on the cover of the December issue of Southern Living, and it was the winning recipe for the annual white cake recipe.  My cake did not turn out looking quite as perfect as the one on the magazine (be sure to refrigerate it after you fill the layers ASAP or else the melted ganache will pull the cake apart and may break some pieces...) - but hey, it's the taste that counts, right?  First, you start off by making 3 layers of gingerbread cake.  Melted chocolate chips, softened butter, sour cream, and hot water make it exceptionally moist.  And the molasses, spices, and vanilla give it a perfectly spiced flavor.  After the cakes have cooled, you make the silky ganache.  And this is what makes the cake so rich; it's mainly chocolate chips, butter, sweetened condensed milk, and heavy cream. Wow...now that sounds like a heart attack just waiting to happen.  But we're not even done yet.  As you slather the ganache between the cake layers,  you'll also sprinkle a generous amount of toffee bits on top. Pop it in the fridge for a few hours, and then spread on the "icing on the cake": the ginger whipped cream. I didn't think ginger would taste very good in whipped cream, but it's absolutely heavenly.  Especially since it uses fresh ginger (I'm not sure how dried ginger would have tasted, but I'm definitely sticking to fresh when I make this whipped cream). After all those hours preparing this cake, and when you finally take a bite, it will taste like "all the wonderful flavors that come tumbling from a stocking: milk chocolate santas, gingerbread men, and buttery toffee candy."


You can find this spectacular recipe here.