Apple stuffed french toast.

• Prep: 20 min. + chilling Bake: 35 min.
• Yield: 6 Servings

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Ingredients

• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, cubed
• 2 tablespoons light corn syrup
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• 12 slices Italian bread (1/2 inch thick)
• 2 large tart apples, peeled and thinly sliced
• 6 eggs
• 1-1/2 cups milk
• 1-1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• CARAMEL SAUCE:
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup butter, cubed
• 1 tablespoon light corn syrup

Directions

• In a small saucepan, combine the brown sugar, butter and corn syrup; cook and stir over medium heat until thickened. Pour into a greased 13-in. x 9-in. baking dish; top with half of the pecans, a single layer of bread and remaining pecans. Arrange apples and remaining bread over the top.
• In a large bowl, whisk the eggs, milk, cinnamon, vanilla, salt and nutmeg. Pour over bread. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
• Remove from the refrigerator 30 minutes before baking. Bake, uncovered, at 350° for 35-40 minutes or until lightly browned.
• In a small saucepan, combine the sauce ingredients. Cook and stir over medium heat until thickened. Serve with French toast. Yield: 6 servings.

Pork with Squash and Apples

Ingredients

• 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• 1 1/2 teaspoons minced garlic (about 2 large cloves)
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh sage
• 2 1-pound pork tenderloins, trimmed
• Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 small butternut squash, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces
• 2 cooking apples, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1 medium red onion, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1 tablespoon honey mustard
• 1 sprig fresh rosemary
• 5 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into pieces

Directions

• Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Mix the nutmeg, 1 teaspoon garlic and the sage in a bowl. Rub over the pork and season with salt and pepper.
• Toss the squash, apples, onion, the remaining 1/2 teaspoon garlic, the honey mustard, and salt and pepper to taste in a bowl. Spread out on a long sheet of foil. Add the rosemary and 3 tablespoons butter, then bring the ends of the foil together and crimp to seal into a packet. Place the packet on a baking sheet and roast on the upper rack until tender, 30 to 35 minutes. Poke holes in the packet to release steam.
• Meanwhile, heat a large ovenproof skillet over medium-high heat. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons butter, then brown the pork on all sides, about 8 minutes. Add 2 tablespoons water and scrape up any browned bits from the pan, then transfer the skillet to the lower oven rack and roast until a thermometer registers 150, about 15 minutes. Transfer the meat to a cutting board and let rest 5 minutes.
• Return the skillet to medium heat. Add 1/2 cup water, scrape up any browned bits and simmer about 2 minutes. Slice the pork and drizzle with the pan juices. Serve with the squash and apples.

Per serving: Calories 487; Fat 22 g (Saturated 12 g); Cholesterol 164 mg; Sodium 367 mg; Carbohydrate 25 g; Fiber 5 g; Protein 47 g

Easy Apple Crisp from Disney's Grand Californian Hotel and Spa

Please enjoy this simple video on how to make Apple Crisp.

Apple Vinaigrette (Animal Kingdom)

Yield: 10 servings

Ingredients:2 each Apple, puree
1 Tablespoon Dijon Mustard
1/3 cup Cider Vinegar
½ cup Lemon Juice, fresh squeezed
2 cups Olive Oil
1 ½ each Lemon Zest, fresh
To taste Kosher Salt
To taste Fresh Ground Black Pepper

Method of Preparation: 
1. Peel and shred about two apples through the mandoline and put in a stainless steel bowl with the Dijon Mustard.
2. Whisk in the cider vinegar and the lemon juice, and slowly add in the olive oil.
3. Stir in the fresh grated lemon zests and mix well.
4. Adjust the seasonings with Kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper.

(Recipe from allears.net)

Apple and Jicama Salad

Yield: 8 servings

INGREDIENTS

4 Apples

3 tablespoons Olive Oil

Salt and Pepper to taste

1 Jicama, peeled and julienned

1/2 cup Red Onions, diced

1/2 cup Radish Slices

4 cups Spinach or Mixed Greens, washed and spun

Port and Yogurt Dressing

2 ounces Port Wine

8 ounces Yogurt

Method

1. Wash apples. Cut in half and remove seeds. Cut all halves into slices. Place in a mixing bowl and drizzle with olive oil and salt and pepper.

2. Place apples on a grill on low heat to caramelize and impart some of the smoky flavor. Chill grilled apples and set aside.

3. Wash and peel the jicama. Cut into slices, then julienne. Place in a large mixing bowl.

4. Add the red onions, radish slices, and spinach. Remove the apples from the refrigerator and cut into large dice. Place in bowl.

5. To make the dressing, place the yogurt in a bowl and add the port wine. Mix well.

6. Take the yogurt dressing and add to the bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste. Mix and serve.

Note: Peaches may be substituted for apples.

(recipe from allears.net photo from google images) 

African Fruit Fool.

Makes: 10 portions

Ingredients:
1 pineapple, peeled and diced
2 green apples, peeled and diced
1 mango, peeled and diced
1 papaya, small, peeled and diced
1 pound red seedless grapes, stamped
5 bananas, peeled and sliced
1 bottle sweetened shredded coconut
1.2 ounce vanilla extract
1 pound sweetened condensed milk
1 cup heavy cream

Method:
Combine all diced fruits. Mix vanilla and sweetened condensed milk. Whip heavy cream until stiff peaks form, then blend into above ingredients.
Refrigerate and serve cold.


(Recipe from allears.net Photo from Disney website.)

Fun Food Facts.

Did you know a packet of crisps takes 3 days to digest?

If you put a tooth in a glass of coke overnight, the sugar in the drink will make the tooth completely dissolve.

Carrots taste sweeter after they’ve been cooked.

Lemons contain more sugar than strawberries.

The first breakfast cereal ever produced was Shredded Wheat.

If you are cold you are more likely to be hungry because you use energy to keep warm.

70% of your body is water.

It takes 3500 calories to make a pound of fat.

The smaller the berry the sweeter the taste.

Popcorn has been around for 6000 years.

There are 1200 varieties of watermelon.

50 years ago Cheerios were called Cheerioats.

In New Zealand there are approximately 40 million sheep and only 4 million people meaning sheep outnumber people 10 to 1!

Ketchup and Tomato Sauce account for approximately half of all tomatoes eaten.

Taiwan's top selling pizza is a seafood delight with onions, peas, squid, shrimp and crab topping the pizza pie.

The average person could go without food for a month, but only for a week without water.

The first fruit to be eaten on the moon was a peach.

Almonds are a member of the peach family.

Apples are made up of 25% air, that is why they float. 

Apple seed contains cyanide. 

Avocado has the highest protein and oil content of all fruits, but most of this is the healthier unsaturated type.

Black-eyed peas are really beans.

Black pepper is the most popular spice in the world. 

Butter and margarine are similar in calories, the difference is that butter is higher in saturated fats, while margarine generally has more unsaturated fats. 

Capsaicin, which makes hot peppers "hot" to the human mouth, is best neutralized by casein, the main protein found in milk.

Chili heat is measured in Scoville units, named after the pharmacist Thomas Scoville.

Carrots were originally purple in colour, changing in the 17th Century to orange with newer varieties. 

Celery requires more calories to eat and digest than it contains. 

Cherries are a member of the rose family. 

Chocolate is a particularly good source of magnesium, potassium and calcium. It also has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. 

On the down side chocolate contains caffeine and has a high fat level. 

Coffee is the most recognized smell in the world. 

Cranberries are sorted for ripeness by bouncing them; a fully ripened cranberry can be dribbled like a basketball. 

Doughnuts were orginally made of raised dough with a nut in the centre.

Eggs contain most of the recognised vitamins with the exception of vitamin C.

Eggplants are actually fruits, and classified botanically as berries.

Fish consumption may be more than brain food but also help protect your eyes from age-related macular degeneration, a potential cause of blindness. 

The Himalayan gogi berry contains, weight for weight, more iron than steak, more beta carotene than carrots, more Vitamin C than oranges.

Honey is the only edible food for humans that will never go bad.

Margarine was first called Butterine in England when it was introduced.

Orange does not rhyme with any other word.

Peanuts caqn be one of the ingredients in dynamite.

Pear is a fruit that ripens from the inside out.

Pizza toppings of squid are the most popular variety in Japan.

Sandwiches are named after John Montagu, the Fourth Earl of Sandwich (1718-92), for whom beef was placed between 2 sliced pieces of bread so that he could stay at the gambling table without interruptions for meals.

Soup has its origin as a word from 'sop' or 'sup', meaning the slice of bread on which the broth was poured.

Soy flour and soya flour are richer in calcium and iron than wheat flour, gluten-free and high in protein.

Soy flour is ground from raw soybeans; soya flour from lightly toasted soybeans.

Strawberries are the only fruit which has its seeds on its outer skin.

Swiss cheese ferments with bacteria generating gas which bubbles through the cheese leaving holes; cheese-makers call them "eyes."

The herb Thyme's most active ingredient is thymol, the antibacterial ingredient found in mouthwashes and Vicks Vaporub.

White chocolate is not a true chocolate because it contains no chocolate liquor, instead its made of sugar, cocoa butter, milk solids, lecithin and vanilla. 

White shelled eggs are produced by hens with white feathers and earlobes while brown eggs are produced by hens with red feathers and earlobes; the colour has no relationship to the nutritional quality or taste of the eggs.

There are more chickens in the world than people!

Over the last half a century food production actually increased faster than population.

The onion is named after a Latin word meaning large pearl.

During a lifetime the average person eats about 35 tons of food.

In France, people eat approximately 500,000,000 snails per year.

Within 2 hours of standing in daylight, milk loses between half and two-thirds of its vitamin B content. 

Watermelons are 97% water, whilst lettuce 97%, tomatoes 95%, carrots 90%, and bread 30%.

Carrots are rich in beta-carotene, a substance our bodies convert into vitamin A.

When an egg floats in water, it is “off” and should not be eaten. As eggs age, gases build up inside the shell making it more buoyant. This is the best way to test whether an egg has gone rotten without having to break open the shell, risking the foul odor escaping.

Approximately 44 million tons of bananas are produced annually, compared to more than 60 million tomatoes. Apples are the third most popular (36 million tons), then oranges (34 million tons) and watermelons (22 million tons).

Coca-cola was originally green in colour. 

Eggplants are actually fruits, and classified botanically as berries. 

Fish consumption may be brain food, but also help protect your eyes from age-related macular degeneration, a potential cause of blindness.

Flamingos owe their pink or reddish colour to the rich sources of carotenoid pigments in the algae and small crustaceans that they eat. 

Fortune cookies are not Chinese, they were invented in Los Angeles around 1920.

Lettuce is the only vegetable or fruit which is not sold frozen, canned, processed, cooked, or in any other form but fresh.

Pineapple is the international symbol of hospitality.

Pizza originated in the early 1700's in Naples, Italy.

A raisin in a glass of champagne will keep floating to the top and sinking to the bottom.

Tomatoes used to be considered poisonous.

Wrigley's gum was the first product to have a bar code.

An ounce of chocolate contains about 20 mg of caffeine.

Chocolate is the number one flavour in the world, beating vanilla and banana by 3-to-1.

Over 90% of all fish caught are caught in the northern hemisphere.