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Mennonite Toast

A toasted bread dish made by dipping slices in beaten eggs and milk, frying, then buttering and dusting with powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Mennonite Toast

Why it works: Milk and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Mennonite Toast

Ingredients

Directions

Make the egg mixture

  1. Beat the eggs well in a bowl.

  2. Add the sweet milk and salt, and mix thoroughly.

Prepare and fry the toast

  1. Cut the bread into 1-inch thick slices and remove the crusts.

  2. Dip the bread slices into the egg mixture.

  3. Fry the dipped slices in hot lard or drippings until golden brown.

Finish and serve

  1. Butter the fried toast and sprinkle with powdered sugar before serving hot.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the milk and bread together and help the coating set into a custard-like crust when fried.
Sweet milk
Adds moisture and softens the bread so the slices soak up the egg coating evenly.
Baker's bread
Acts as the base that absorbs the egg mixture and fries into a crisp outside with a soft centre.

The step that matters

Frying the dipped slices in hot fat. Fat that is not hot enough lets the soaked bread absorb grease and turn soggy, while very hot fat can brown the outside before the egg coating cooks through. Medium-high heat gives even golden browning.

“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.

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