You know what’s awesome? Toast. Toast is quite the wonder stuff. I’m
so smitten with toast that I have a tattoo of a toaster on my left arm.
It’s a vintage Toastmaster. When people inquire after the significance
of the tattoo, all I can say is this: “I like toast.”
Toast is multipurpose and multifaceted. There are as many ways of
eating it as there are people who eat it. As a quick and easy breakfast,
toast is a vehicle for peanut butter, jam, fried eggs, avocado slices,
or any manner of other toppings. Since the USDA recommends eating 6-11
servings of grains a day, a couple of slices of bread can kick-start
your morning quite well. The difference between a toasted cheese
sandwich and a cold cheese sandwich is, quite literally, palpable. And
you certainly can’t have a BLT on soggy regular ol’ bread, that’s for
sure. Moreover, for dinner, it’s absolutely necessary for dishes like
Welsh Rarebit and my childhood favorite, Creamed Asparagus on Toast
Points. (It was the 1970s. Don’t judge me.)
There’s a toast bar in my neighborhood that does a mean Swedish-style
toast consisting of thickly sliced bread, toasted and buttered, topped
with jam and cheese. They also do some mainstream toppings, peanut
butter, jams, cinnamon sugar, and the like. It may seem an odd
indulgence, but the heartwarming effect of occasionally having someone
else make a sugary, buttery slice of cinnamon toast for you is
incalculable. That, and a hot cup of coffee, is a great antidote to
pretty much anything life can throw at you.
It’s a bit comforting to know that I’m not the only fanatic out there. It’s a bit disconcerting, too, though, I must admit. Dr Toast’s Amazing World of Toast is an en-tire blog dedicated to the wonders of crispy, heated bread; the Red Toaster Guide is specifically geared towards all things red and toasterly; Mr. Breakfast’s 335 Ways to Enjoy Toast
lists almost an entire year’s worth of toast variations (number 145,
toast topped with bleu cheese and honey — sounds pretty tasty right
now); and The Toaster has some great toast/toaster inspired street art. Toaster technology is pretty awesome, too. The Toaster Museum Foundation is a non-profit org dedicated to documenting and preserving the history, and the future, of toasters.
I blame The New Duncan Imperials
for my obsession. Don’t get me wrong, I’d liked toast long before NDI
came around, but they sold toast at their live shows and that was just
the niftiest thing ever. It wasn’t just any toast, either — it was Super Toast.
You could get it any way you wanted, but the highest-level incarnation
came with butter, peanut butter, Nutella, grape jelly, and candy
sprinkles. That and a couple of beers — along with some weird guys on
stage, dressed in matching suits, jumping around and singing about
Tilt-A-Whirls and velour — is my definition of heaven.
Actually, now that I think of it, my friend Sue also made a version
of Super Toast. Back in elementary school, we were both latchkey kids,
and after school we’d head over to her house for Happy Days re-runs,
after school snacks, and general mayhem. She made a white bread and
butter sandwich, toasted, that usually also contained chocolate syrup,
cinnamon sugar, and/or Velveeta slices. And it worked.
This seems to be all about comfort and remembrances and breakfasts
and whatnot, but really, a bit of the magic of toast can be neatly
summed up in 2 words — Maillard Reaction. This is the technical term for
the amino acids and sugars in bread caramelizing when heated. It’s the
same thing that makes roasted coffee taste so good and gives dulce de leche its distinctive flavor.
There is something more than thermal reactions, though, that makes
toast so great — that little extra something that can’t be calculated or
science-d out so easily. At its base, toast is just toast, and for
that, there is no quantifiable scale. It just is.
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