Guava Jelly-Stuffed Hawaiian French Toast with Coconut Syrup

Yesterday morning the Professor cooked up a wonderful batch of guava jelly-stuffed french toast that she served with a batch of freshly made coconut syrup. It was an excellent start to a Sunday morning.

After enjoying the french toast and cleaning up a bit we immediately opened a bottle of prosecco we are hoping to write about for Wine Blogging Wednesday # 27 - Festive Sparkling Wines. More on that later.

In the meantime I’ll let the Professor tell the story of how she made the toast…

The Professor’s Guava Jelly-Stuffed Hawaiian French Toast


This is an approximation of the recipe I used for the French toast yesterday. Of course, I've made it from memory, not from a recipe. Oh, but what a sweet memory it is... Every time I visited Hawa'ii, I was served this sweet breakfast. It always reminds me of the heavenly fragrances of pikake jasmine and plumeria flowers, the salty, cool Pacific breeze and the hues of blue that blur the line between the sky and the ocean...

Ingredients

• 4 thick-cut slices of King's Hawaiian bread (can be substituted with challa bread when made in NY)
• 3-4 Tbsp Guava jelly
• 3 Eggs
• 1/8 C to 1/4 C Milk (I used soy milk)
• ¼ tsp Salt
• ¼ tsp Sugar
• ¼ tsp Cinnamon
• ¼ tsp Vanilla extract
• 2-3 Tbsp Butter

1) Cut the bread ahead of time so the sliced sides are somewhat dry
2) Insert a small, sharp knife in the middle of the bread (on the cut side) and scoop out some bread to make room for the jelly
3) Stuff a little less than 1 Tbsp of guava jelly into the cavity in the bread
4) Press the scooped out pieces back into the bread from the outside to seal the bread
5) In a large mixing bowl, lightly whisk together eggs, milk, salt, sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla
6) Melt butter in a griddle (or a frying pan) on med-high
7) Dip the bread into the egg mixture, coating it evenly and letting the egg soak through the bread a little (but not to get soggy)
8) Place the bread on the hot griddle and brown all sides
9) Serve with coconut syrup (recipe, below) and slices of fresh fruit (papaya, pineapple, berries), if available


Home-made coconut syrup

1) In a sauce pan, heat 1 C coconut milk and 1/3 C (or more, if you like your syrup very sweet) to boil.
2) Turn the heat to low and reduce the coconut milk to ½.
Makes about ½ C syrup.