Melba toast is a dry, crisp and thinly sliced

rusk A rusk is a hard, dry Biscuit#Biscuits in British usage, biscuit or a twice-baked bread. It is sometimes used as a teether for babies. In some cultures, rusk is made of cake rather than bread: this is sometimes referred to as cake rusk. In the ...

, often served with soup and salad or topped with either melted cheese or

pâté Pâté ( , , ) is a forcemeat. Originally, the dish was cooked in a pastry case; in more recent times it is more usually cooked without pastry in a terrine. Various ingredients are used, which may include meat from pork, poultry, fish or bee ...

. It is named after

Dame ''Dame'' is a traditionally British honorific title given to women who have been admitted to certain orders of chivalry. It is the female equivalent of ''Sir'', the title used by knights. Baronet, Baronetesses Suo jure, in their own right also u ...

Nellie Melba Dame Nellie Melba (born Helen Porter Mitchell; 19 May 186123 February 1931) was an Australian operatic lyric coloratura soprano. She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian era and the early twentieth century, and was the f ...

, the stage name of Australian opera singer Helen Porter Mitchell. Its name is thought to date from 1897, when the singer was very ill and it became a staple of her diet. The toast was created for her by a chef who was also a fan of her,

Auguste Escoffier Georges Auguste Escoffier (; 28 October 1846 – 12 February 1935) was a French chef, restaurateur, and culinary writer who popularised and updated traditional French cooking methods. Much of Escoffier's technique was based on that of Marie-A ...

, who also created the Peach Melba dessert for her. The hotel proprietor

César Ritz César Ritz, born Cäsar Ritz (23 February 1850 – 26 October 1918), was a Swiss hotelier and founder of several hotels, most famously the Hôtel Ritz Paris, Hôtel Ritz in Paris and the The Ritz London Hotel, Ritz and Carlton Hotel, London, Ca ...

supposedly named it in a conversation with Escoffier. Melba toast is made by lightly toasting slices of bread under a grill, on both sides. The resulting toast is then sliced laterally. These thin slices are then returned to the grill with the untoasted sides towards the heat source, resulting in toast half the normal thickness. Melba toast is also available commercially, and was at one time given to infants who were

teething Teething is the process by which an infant's first teeth (the deciduous teeth, often called "baby teeth" or "milk teeth") appear by emerging through the gums, typically arriving in pairs. The mandibular central incisors are the first primary te ...

as a hard food substance on which to chew. In the UK, this is similar to a commercial product known as ''French toast'', although it is very different from the egg-based dish known as

French toast French toast is a Dish (food), dish of sliced bread soaked in beaten eggs as food, eggs and often milk or cream, then pan-fried. Alternative names and variants include eggy bread, Bombay toast, gypsy toast, and poor knights (of Windsor).''Oxfo ...

internationally. In France, it is referred to as ''croutes en dentelle''.

History

In 1925, the Mayo Brothers prescribed the "Eighteen Day Reducing Diet" to

Ethel Barrymore Ethel Barrymore (born Ethel Mae Blythe; August 15, 1879 – June 18, 1959) was an American actress and a member of the Barrymore family of actors. Barrymore was a stage, screen and radio actress whose career spanned six decades, and was regarde ...

. It included Melba toast, which made the toast very popular at the time.Print-ad, 1925:https://www.sciencesource.com/archive/18-Day-Reducing-Diet--1925-SS2229623.html; and Sophie C. Cubbison, autobiographical sketch, unpublished typescript. Summarized in William Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi, ''History of Soybeans and Soyfoods in Mexico and Central America, 1877-2009'' (Lafayette CA: SoyInfo Press, 2009), 52-53. Melba toast was also eaten as a component of the Banting diet.

References

Breads Twice-baked goods Toast dishes Nellie Melba {{bread-stub

History

See also

References