Skip to main content
Drink

Toast and Water

A beverage made by steeping toasted bread in boiling water, then cooling and optionally flavoring with lemon, orange peel, or currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Toast and Water

Ingredients

Directions

Toast the bread

  1. Cut a crust of bread from a stale loaf, about twice the thickness of regular toast.

  2. Toast the bread until completely browned, but not burnt.

Make the toast water

  1. Place the toasted bread in a jug.

  2. Pour boiling water over it to your desired amount.

  3. Cover the jug and let it stand until completely cold.

  4. Alternatively, place the bread in a mug. Cover with boiling water. Let it stand until cold.

  5. Fill with cold spring water.

  6. Strain through a fine sieve.

Flavor

  1. For added flavor, infuse with thin slices of lemon, dried orange peel, or currant jelly.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

What each ingredient does

Stale bread
Provides the toasty flavor and browned aroma that define the water.

The step that matters

Toasting the bread until completely browned, but not burnt. Toasting develops browned, roasted flavors through the Maillard reaction and caramelization. Under-toasted bread gives a flat, pale taste, while burnt bread adds bitter, acrid notes that carry into the water.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Vegetable SoupVegetable Soup350 recipesRaspberry VinegarRaspberry Vinegar214 recipesBrown Coffee with EggBrown Coffee with Egg175 recipesBlackberry CordialBlackberry Cordial129 recipes