Toast, to Make Dry
To make dry toast properly, a great deal of attention is required; much more, indeed, than people generally suppose. Never use new bread for making any kind of toast, as it renders it heavy, and, besides, is very extravagant. Procure a loaf of household bread about two days old; cut off as many slices as may be required, not quite 1/4 inch in thickness; trim off the crusts and ragged edges, put the bread on a toasting-fork, and hold it before a very clear fire. Move it backwards and forwards until the bread is nicely coloured; then turn it and toast the other side, and do not place it so near the fire that it blackens. Dry toast should be more gradually made than buttered toast, as its great beauty consists in its crispness, and this cannot be attained unless the process is slow and the bread is allowed gradually to colour. It should never be made long before it is wanted, as it soon becomes tough, unless placed on the fender in front of the fire. As soon as each piece is ready, it should be put into a rack, or stood upon its edges, and sent quickly to table.
Toast, To Make Hot Buttered. -A loaf of household bread about two days old answers for making toast better than cottage bread, the latter not being a good shape, and too crusty for the purpose. Cut as many nice even slices as may be required, rather more than 1/4 inch in thickness, and toast them before a very bright fire, without allowing the bread to blacken, which spoils the appearance and lavour of all toast. When of a nice colour on both sides, put it on a hot plate; divide some good butter into small pieces, place them on the toast, set this before the fire, and when the butter is just beginning to melt spread it lightly over the toast. Trim off the crust and ragged edges, divide each round into 4 pieces, and send the toast quickly to table. Some persons cut the slices of toast across from corner to corner, so making the pieces of a three-cornered shape. Soyer recommends that each slice should be cut into pieces as soon as it is buttered, and when all are ready, that they intended to be served on. He says that by cutting through 4 or 5 slices at a time, all the butter is squeezed out of the upper ones, while the bottom one is swimming in fat liquid. It is highly essential to use good butter for making this dish.
Two related methods: plain dry toast and hot buttered toast, both made at an open fire. The instructions translate to a grill or broiler more faithfully than to a pop-up toaster.
- The hinge: slow for dry, brisk for butteredThe recipe says only that dry toast should be made more gradually than buttered, because 'its great beauty consists in its crispness'. A pop-up toaster cannot easily do this; use a low grill setting and give it longer.
- "A very clear fire" and "a very bright fire"A clear fire is one burnt down past smoke and flame to steady red coals. Under a modern grill, that means the element fully heated and the bread a few inches below it, not pressed up against it.
- BreadHousehold bread was a plain wheaten loaf baked at home or by the local baker, dense-crumbed and unsliced. Two-day-old bread cuts cleanly and takes colour evenly; fresh bread tears and steams. Any firm white sandwich loaf works, cut by hand.
- Slice thicknessJust under 1/4 inch for dry toast, just over for buttered. Both are thinner than a standard supermarket slice, which is closer to 1/2 inch. Thin slices are the point of dry toast.
- Butter timingThe butter is cut into small pieces, laid on the hot toast, and allowed to soften near the heat before being spread lightly. Butter worked hard into hot toast soaks straight through; the dish depends on it sitting near the surface.
- The toast rackStanding toast on edge in a rack lets steam escape, which is generally given as the reason English toast racks exist. Stacked flat on a plate, dry toast goes leathery within minutes.
- Soyer's cutting ruleCut and butter each slice as it comes off the heat rather than stacking several and cutting through the pile. The advice is sound: pressure from the knife drives butter out of the top slices into the bottom one.
- YieldNeither method gives a quantity; both are made to order and served immediately.
Toast belongs to the era of the open coal or wood fire, when a long-handled toasting-fork was standard kitchen equipment and browning bread was a matter of managing radiant heat rather than pressing a lever. The insistence that dry toast requires 'much more, indeed, than people generally suppose' reflects its place at the Victorian breakfast and tea tables. The Soyer cited is Alexis Soyer, the celebrated chef of the Reform Club and among the best-known cooks in mid-nineteenth-century Britain; the distinction between household bread and cottage bread reflects a period when loaves came in recognised shapes from local bakers rather than in standard sliced form.