Toaster

“ Many seem to think that they have made toast when they brown the outside of a slice of bread. Have they?
The object in making toast is to evaporate all moisture from the bread, and holding a slice over the fire to singe does not accomplish this; it only warms the moisture, making the inside of the bread doughy and decidedly indigestible. The true way of preparing it is to cut the bread into slices a quarter of an inch thick, trim off all crust, put the slices in a pan or plate, place them in the oven—which must not be too hot—take them out when a delicate brown, and butter at once. ”

“ An ideal piece of toast is crisp and golden throughout. But many will say that they prefer toast that is soft inside, and that they cannot eat hard, dry toast. The ideal piece of toast is not really so hard as it seems. It breaks and crumbles very easily, and is quickly moistened by the saliva. If one would persevere with a slice, he would soon learn to prefer it to any other kind; at all events, that which is soft inside should not be given to the sick. ”

“ Good tea must be steeped not boiled. Mother's way is to make hers on the table. I have been drilled over and over in tea making, and am skillful.
I made some dainty slices of toast in this way: I cut off the crust and put it aside for a pudding, and as the oven was hot, I placed the bread in a pan, and let it lean against the edge in a slanting position. When it was a pale golden brown I took it out, and carried it to grandmamma. The object of toasting bread is to get the moisture out of it. This is more evenly done in the oven than over the fire. ”

“ The bloodless-looking woman who sat uneasily at her own board clutching at a thin fragment of cold dry toast that hung cheerlessly awry in the silver rack, like the last brown leaf to a frosty tree, while she crunched the toast, spoke dryly of the poor ”

“ 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 eats 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. ”

“ The rackful of dry toast which is brought to you for breakfast could scarcely have been so neatly sliced without the help of a knife, but the toast is not the less in bodily presence on the breakfast-table because the knife that cut it has been left behind in the kitchen. ”

“ In whatever way it is divided, however, a portion of the toast which has received the trail, and on which it should always be sent to table, must invariably be served to all who partake of it. The very old fashion of trussing the bird with its own bill, by running it through the thighs and body, is again adopted by very good cooks of the present day ”

“ But first wait till I fetch you some more tea and toast.’
She tripped away, and presently returned with a fresh trayful; and Toad, pitching into the toast with avidity, his spirits quite restored to their usual level, told her about the boathouse, and the fish-pond, and the old walled kitchen-garden; and about the pig-styes, and the stables, and the pigeon-house, and the hen-house; and about the dairy, and the wash-house, and the china-cupboards, and the linen-presses (she liked that bit especially) ”

“ Dry Toast.—Ought not to be toasted until quite ready to serve; when done, place it in a toast-rack, or standing upon its edges, one piece resting against another; any kind of toast that has been made half an hour is not worth eating. ”

“ Then I think a small piece of toast is indicated;' and he proceeded to hack the loaf to pieces with great vigour.
"'Hun over somewhere, sounds like,' said a sleepy voice as the throb of an engine was heard overhead.
"'Oh, I can't help his troubles,' observed the toast-maker airily. 'He's got no right to come at tea-time. ”

“ Sterling. One moment please. One toast on Christmas night! Ned, give us a toast.
All the Women. [But not in unison.] Oh, yes! A toast! [Ad lib.]
Warden. [Holding up his glass.]
Here's to those whom we love!
And to those who love us!
And to those who love those whom we love
And to those who love those who love us!
All the Men. [Not in unison.] Good! Bravo! Bully toast! [Ad lib.]
[Every one drinks.
Blanche. One more toast, Dick. [To the others.] Christmas Day is our boy's birthday.
Ruth. Surely! a toast to Richard! ”

“ The slices of bread and butter, which they give you with your tea, are as thin as poppy leaves. But there is another kind of bread and butter usually eaten with tea, which is toasted by the fire, and is incomparably good. You take one slice after the other and hold it to the fire on a fork till the butter is melted, so that it penetrates a number of slices at once: this is called toast. ”

“ If the best results are desired in the making of toast, considerable attention must be given to the heat that is to produce the toast. Whatever kind is employed, it should be steady and without flame. ”

“ I was tired and hungry, and, while the diligence was being unloaded, I entered a caffé close by, and called for some buttered toast. My hair (I had plenty at that time) stood on end at the answer I received. There was no buttered toast to be had, the waiter said. "It was not the custom." I confess I augured ill of a city from whose caffés, unlike all others throughout Italy, such a staple of breakfast was banished.
I am fond of buttered toast, I own. If it is a weakness, I candidly plead guilty. My mother—bless her soul!—brought me up in the faith of buttered toast. ”

“ It was the waiter who raised him from this other abyss where he had been like to perish, the waiter and the things, including tea: plates, forks, napkins, cups and saucers, tea and hot water, jam, biscuit, toast. There was something particularly reassuring about that plate of nicely matched triangles of buttered toast. It spoke of a sane and orderly world where you were never taken off your feet.
"How many lumps?" demanded the pouring flapper. ”

“ Making Breakfast.—If you have toast to make, or bacon to cook, take care to have a clear fire, so that it may be done quickly, when wanted, and not before; for both toast and bacon should be hot from the fire, and not suffered to stand after they are done. ”

“ Solid breakfasts are only fit for those who have much solid exercise to take after it; otherwise heartburn may be looked for. Avoid new bread and spongy rolls; look on muffins and crumpets as inventions of men of worse than sanguinary principles, and hot buttered toast as of equally wicked origin. Dry toast is the safest morning food, perhaps, for persons of indifferent powers of digestion; or they may substitute for it the imperial fashion set by Marcus Antoninus. Of liquids I may next speak; and in this our ancient friend, Tea, takes the precedence. ”

“ Then they sat for a while drinking tea and eating buttered toast in the drawing-room. A supply of buttered toast fully to gratify the wants of three or four men just home from hunting has never yet been created by the resources of any establishment. But the greater marvel is that the buttered toast has never the slightest effect on the dinner which is to follow in an hour or two. ”

“ I never burn my Toasts—I never put them too near the Fire at first—& yet, you see, there is not a Corner but what is well browned.—I hope you like dry Toast."—"With a reasonable quantity of Butter spread over it, very much—said Charlotte—but not otherwise.—" "No more do I—said he exceedingly pleased—We think quite alike there.—So far from dry Toast being wholesome, I think it a very bad thing for the Stomach. Without a little butter to soften it, it hurts the Coats of the Stomach. ”

“ Young fellows being always hungry, and tea and dry toast being the meagre fare of the evening meal, it was a trick of some of the boys to impale a slice of meat upon a fork, at dinner-time, and stick the fork, holding it, beneath the table, so that they could get it at tea-time. ”

“ We do not hesitate to say this is the best and largest collection of original and popular toasts published. Hundreds never in print before and all the classics by world-renowned authors:
Longfellow
Wordsworth
Mrs. Wilcox
Burns
Tom Moore
Thos. Hood
Ben Johnson
Scott
Thackeray
Goldsmith
Byron
Shakspere This is a book for all classes. There’s no telling when you may be called upon to propose a toast. To be unprepared means embarrassment. Send for this book and memorize a few. By mail, 15c; cloth-bound, 30c. Mention “500 Toasts.” ”

“ Toast one or two thin slices of bread with the crust cut off; if there are two slices, have them of equal size. When still hot, spread evenly over them a very little fresh butter, and sprinkle over some salt. Now pour over a small tea-cupful of boiling milk, thickened with half a tea-spoonful of flour, and salted to taste. If the invalid can not take milk, the toast may be moistened with boiling water. Serve immediately. It is a very appetizing dish, when fresh made and hot. ”

“ A few drops of cream are easily saved for the patient’s tea from a small quantity of milk; and cream in small quantities is considered more digestible than milk.
All cooks think they can make toast. There is about one person in ten thousand who really does know how to make it;{316} who actually appreciates the difference between a thin, symmetrical, well-yellowed, crisp piece of toast with the crust cut off, and just from the fire, and a thick, unshapely slice, unevenly crisped on the outside, and of doughy softness in the centre. One is digestible ”

“ The business of toast-drinking is reduced to the nicest system. A regular official, called a toast master, stood behind the lord mayor with a paper, from which he read the toasts in their order. Every one, according to his several rank, pretensions, and station, must be toasted in his gradation; and every person toasted must have his name announced by the official,—the larger dignitaries being proposed alone in their glory, while the smaller fry are read out by the dozen,—and to each toast somebody must get up and make a speech. ”

“ Place under the birds, in the dripping-pan, slices of toast to catch the trail, baste incessantly with butter during the time they are roasting, dish up on the toast, and serve on a very hot dish. Some people sprinkle the birds over with fine breadcrumbs just before serving, and serve on breadcrumbs, made from bread soaked in lemon-juice and port wine, instead of toast. ”

“ I now have the pleasure of introducing to your notice the toast of the evening—a toast endeared by a thousand associations, and rendered classical by the recollection of the great and good men who have given it in times gone by from this very chair— (applause) . I need hardly say, gentlemen, that that toast is the renowned Hit-im and Hold-im shire hunt— (renewed applause) —a hunt second to none in the kingdom; a hunt whose name is famous throughout the land, and whose members are the very flower and élite of society— (renewed applause) . ”

“ Who does not know the way in which a lately married couple's little dinner-party stretches itself out from the pure simplicity of a fried sole and a leg of mutton to the attempt at clear soup, the unfortunately cold dish of round balls which is handed about after the sole, and the brightly red jelly, and beautifully pink cream, which are ordered, in the last agony of ambition, from the next pastry cook's shop? ”

“ She likes to eat. She hurries up, striding reared on long uncanny legs, When food is going. Oh yes, she can make haste when she likes. She snaps the soft bread from my hand in great mouthfuls, Opening her rather pretty wedge of an iron, pristine face Into an enormously wide-beaked mouth Like sudden curved scissors, And gulping at more than she can swallow, and working her thick, soft tongue, And having the bread hanging over her chin. ”

“ The following morning, Toad, who had overslept himself as usual, came down to breakfast disgracefully late, and found on the table a certain quantity of egg-shells, some fragments of cold and leathery toast, a coffee-pot three-fourths empty, and really very little else ”

“ Fetch, I prithee, a flagon of morning milk for me and for my gold-stick, who is, alas! dumb and all unable to speak for herself. Make also a plate of golden toast, arrange neatly on a tray, and fly upstairs with it, that I may nibble the portion in all its pristine hotness. ”

“ 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. ”

“ No matter how simple the dish, insist that it be attractive in appearance, and that every dish placed on the table show the care of the cook in its preparation; for instance, have every piece of toast of the same size and shape, evenly browned and carefully arranged on a hot plate. ”

“ You should have watched how each one retired within himself, scratched his head or pensively caressed his tail as a means of inspiration, how each silently rehearsed his little speech. Unfortunately the order of the toasts had been arranged beforehand—not only the order, but the number as well. Splendid fasting might be forgiven, but the cancelling of a cherished toast—never! ”

“ Now when you have been busy out of doors all day long, steak sizzling in butter, potatoes steaming through burst jackets, thick slices of snowy bread, and tea glowing like amber when it is poured from the pot in the late sunlight, are just about the finest things ever fashioned. ”