Best Air Fryer Hong Kong Style French Toast 港式西多士

Hong Kong Style French Toast with peanut butter 港式西多士 with a pillowy interior is perfection! Compared to regular French Toast, HK French Toast consists of fluffy milk bread, creamy peanut butter, kaya jam, and a slight sweetness of condensed milk, an egg-battered sandwich air-fried to a golden brown perfection! It is the best thing ever invented. 

> In This Post: Everything You'll Need For The Best Air Fryer HK Style French Toast Recipe

The Chinese version of French Toast is a classic breakfast dish, often served with Hong Kong milk tea in Hong Kong cafes (cha chaan teng 茶餐廳). A standard fabulous French toast is usually a single slice of soaked bread deep-fried and served hot with butter, fresh fruits, maple syrup, and a dash of cinnamon.

The Chinese sweet breakfast dish is a multi-layered French toast made with thick slices of soft milk bread. The crust of the bread cut off, stuffed with peanut butter filling, a little condensed milk, a generous pat of butter, and bonus points maple syrup on the side.

Check out this quick story summary of our recipe! 

Jump to:

• > In This Post: Everything You'll Need For The Best Air Fryer HK Style French Toast Recipe
• Ingredients and Substitutes
• Instructions
• What To Serve With The Best Air Fried French Toast Recipe
• > Recipe Card
• Best Air Fryer Hong Kong Style French Toast 港式西多士

Ingredients and Substitutes

Hong Kong Style cafe french toast air fried to a golden perfection requires just a few simple ingredients but the results are satisfying. It is the perfect sweet breakfast or afternoon snack.

Milk Bread - Japanese fluffy thick-sliced bread with crust cut off. The type of bread used is essential! Instead of using day-old slices of sad sandwich bread, fresh Japanese thick-sliced bread milk bread is intoxicatingly soft, buttery and slightly sweet. Of course, you can also use whole wheat brioche, cinnamon raisin or challah bread, but the real soul of the HK French Toast is the crustless milk bread.

Creamy Peanut Butter - A creamy, smooth, generous amount of peanut butter makes an excellent filling. 

Sweetened Condensed Milk - This sweet reduction of regular milk is a traditional Cantonese-style dessert ingredient. The taste instantly reminds one of yum cha. Substitute with condensed coconut milk if you are vegan. Compared to cow's milk, condensed milk contains 60% less water but has sugar added. 

Fresh Eggs - Beat two eggs to make an egg batter to soak the pieces of bread in before air frying. Substitute with Just Egg egg ready-made liquid egg replacer if you are on a plant-based diet.

Here are a couple Vegan egg replacer forward dishes I am genuinely obsessed with from the blog! Both these recipes are delicious and easy to make!

Other Just Egg Recipes: 

• Easy Vegan Fried Rice with Mushrooms 生炒牛肉飯
• Vegan Egg Drop Soup with Just Egg 蛋花湯
• Chinese Tomato Egg Stir-fry 番茄炒蛋

Fresh Milk - Use dairy milk or alternatives like oat milk for the egg mixture. 

Butter - Top with a generous square of butter for an indulgent finish of melted butter.

Maple Syrup - Golden syrup is served on the side to dip your HK-style French toast instead of drizzling and smothered directly on top.

Variations Flavours

Kaya Jam - Add a layer of Kaya jam for a delicious aromatic spread. Kaya contains coconut milk, eggs, sugar, and pandan leaves. So rich and aromatic, it is excellent with Hong Kong-style milk tea.

Strawberry Jam - Strawberry jam is nostalgic, but feel free to opt for your favourite fruit-flavoured jelly.

Nutella Hazelnut Spread - Nutella is a delicious chocolate, and hazelnut spread that's always a special treat.

Almond Butter - an excellent alternative to peanut butter with an equal creamy viscosity.

Most dry goods ingredients, tools and supplies can be purchased at local Asian markets or Asian grocery store or Amazon Online.

Instructions

Asian ingredients were added to Western foods, turning "foreign foods" into local flavors, during the colonization of the former British colony - after the Opium War. Today's popular dishes combine British and Chinese, such as milk tea, Baked Spaghetti Bolognese, and French toast at Cha Chaan Teng 茶餐廳 in Hong Kong.  

French Toast Hong Kong style, crispy on the outside and custard-like center. Making this Chinese brunch specialty by air frying instead of deep frying is healthier and uses much less oil. The golden crispy perfection quickly combines five ingredients in just 15 minutes.

Cut the crusts off the bread slices.

Spread a tablespoon of creamy peanut butter to one slice of bread.

Spread some kaya jam to another slice of bread.

Assemble the slices of bread together into sandwiches.

Beat eggs and milk together in a small shallow bowl.

Soak all sides of the sandwich in the egg mixture. Do not over soak or your French toast will be soggy.

How To Air Fry French Toast

Preheat the air fryer to 400F for a few minutes.

Use air fryer parchment paper and line the bottom of the basket for easy clean-ups. 

There is no need to spray with cooking oil spray. 

Place the French Toast into the air fryer and air fry for 375F for 10 minutes until golden brown. Flip halfway. 

The cooking time is 10 minutes, but depending on the air fryer model and the size of your air fryer, you may adjust the time to 2 or 4 mins of cooking time. I use THIS Ninja Foodi Air Fryer!

Remove carefully with kitchen tongs!

Top with a pat of butter.

Then drizzle with sweetened condensed milk, maple syrup or even honey. Warmed-up peanut butter drizzle is also lovely. 

If you are deep frying the French Toast instead of air frying. Heat oil over medium high heat in a large skillet or non-stick frying pan. Carefully lower the whole thing into the pan. Shallow fry the stuffed French Toast until golden and crispy. Remove from oil and let rest on a wire rack. 

Slice the sandwich diagonal to form triangles.

Serve and enjoy.

Pro Tip: Consider pre-cutting your crustless bread into triangles before air frying. This way, there's no explosion of the filling when you cut it with a serrated knife afterwards. 

How To Meal Prep

You can efficiently work this sweet indulgent brunch recipe into your family meal prep ideas for the week. Add this delicious treat with your afternoon tea, a side dish, or a quick snack as a mid-day pick me up!

Pre-cut the bread crusts from the fluffy white bread, but do not spread peanut butter, kaya jam or fruit preserves on the milk bread. Definitely, do not soak the assembled toast into the egg and milk mixture ahead of time.

It takes little prep time anyway. So don't worry about meal prepping this easy brunch recipe.

What To Serve With The Best Air Fried French Toast Recipe

This yummy dish is a great side to your breakfast menu! French toast is often an add-on to your A or B Set Menu (早餐套餐AB餐). Complete your morning with nostalgic feelings!

HK Style Breakfast Tomato Beef Macaroni Soup 蕃茄牛肉通粉 

Hong Kong Style Baked Spaghetti Bolognese 焗肉醬意粉

Pan Fried Supreme Soy Sauce Noodles 豉油皇炒麵

Instant Pot Salted Pork and Century Egg Congee 皮蛋瘦肉粥

I'd love to see how you went with my recipes! Leave a comment below or tag me on Instagram @INSTANOMSS #INSTANOMSS.

> Recipe Card

Print

Pin the above image to your Asian Chinese Recipe Pinterest Board to bookmark this page. We are so excited to share our recipes with you!

More Chinese Recipes

Chinese Steamed Chicken With Shiitake Mushroom 冬菇蒸雞

Air Fryer BBQ Pork Char Siu 氣炸鍋蜜汁叉燒

Red Bean Soup (Instant Pot) 蓮子百合紅豆沙

Braised Beef Brisket & Tendon 柱侯蘿蔔炆牛筋腩

Best Postpartum Pig Trotter Black Vinegar and Ginger 豬腳薑醋

This post contains affiliate links and/or products submitted to Nomss for editorial consideration. To find out more, please visit our About/Disclaimer page.

Remove Ad-Block to view shopping guide!