Is There A Difference Between Melba And Regular Toast?
Regular toast — the kind that starts as sliced bread and then pops up out of your toaster — is heated just enough to give it a little bit of crunch. Unless you like it burned to a cinder, though, it will generally retain a little bit of softness or more than a bit if you slather it with butter, jam, mashed avocado, or other toast toppers. Melba toast, on the other hand, is meant to be dry, dry, dry.
Recipe developer Tommy Leung's melba toast recipe, like any other kind of toast, starts with a loaf of sliced bread. While just about any type of bread will work, depending on what you want the final product to taste like, for frugality's sake, Leung suggests you use bread that's at least a day old. (Tbh, every loaf of bread we own is well over a day old, since who can eat a whole loaf on the same day you shop?) As he explains, "The benefit of using day-old bread is just that it's a great way to make use of bread that might otherwise be a little bit stale." You then take the bread and dry it gently in the oven on a low heat setting (300 F) rather than cooking it quickly at high heat as a toaster would do. The result is toast that is much drier and crunchier, if somewhat paler, than the typical breakfast kind.
Read more: 41 Must Try Hot Sandwich Recipes
What You Can Do With Melba Toast
Once you've made your melba toast, you may be wondering what to do with it, but you have plenty of time to figure it out. Leung tells us, "You can make a big batch of melba toast and store it in an airtight container or glass jar" and says if you do, it should last for a few months at room temperature. One recommendation Leung has for how to use melba toast is as what he calls "a healthier snack for kids," pointing out that bread is "healthier than processed chips and snacks, without all the added sodium and fats." He also likes to use melba toast for avocado toast and suggests that making it from sourdough bread might be extra tasty because, as he explains, "I think the sour tang would work really well with the fatty avocado."
Leung has a few more ideas about how to use melba toast for savory purposes as he feels that "It's an excellent vessel for any kind of delicious dips" and "would look stunning on top of a soup." Melba toast can also be used for desserts, too – for something simple, try it sprinkled with cinnamon sugar and maybe topped with a scoop of ice cream. If you want a more elaborate dish, melba toast is also used as the base for a Turkish pudding called etimek tatlisi. (While this dessert may be delightful, it's not to be confused with Turkish delight.)
Read the original article on Mashed.
