Golden Bread, Watkins Cookbook (1935)

When I first showed this to my husband, he asked "How is this different than French toast?"




I had initially assumed the difference was that people didn't call foods French in 1935. When we went to make it this morning, we realised that this was not the case.

This is much less eggy and way more milky than French Toast. It appears to be an attempt to revive really stale bread for breakfast. Which would have been much simpler had I worked this out earlier and gotten bread from the local bakery a couple days ago instead of a loaf of very white, very fluffy, very engineered to not go stale modern bread from the grocery store.

Rule number one when making a very old recipe: do not assume it is in any way related to what you are used to. Think about why a dish would be made in the time period, and adjust your expectations accordingly.

Slice of bread one ended up being sacrificial, as soaking it like modern French toast caused it to utterly disintegrate upon lifting it out of the mixing bowl.

Slices two and three were dipped as opposed to soaked. They were threatening to fall apart in the pan, so my husband suggested toasting the next two slices to help them hold together better. It worked a bit, but the end lesson here is to use a more solid, more stale bread than one might use otherwise.

A slightly less annoying lesson was that I really have to get in the habit of doing prep before cooking. After adding soy milk and egg to the bowl, I went looking for sugar. Which is when I learned that the ceramic sugar container had fallen and broken, and I didn't actually have any sugar left in the house. Since we were going to pour maple syrup over top anyway, I just left it out. It did no harm to the recipe, but one day I will remember the importance of mise en place. Hopefully.

We both expected this to be a disaster. But the Golden Bread was very nice, without the eggy taste of French toast, and not nearly as sweet either. It went well with a side of breakfast sausage and roast tomato.

If you'd planned on French toast but find at the last minute you don't have enough eggs, this would be a great recipe for saving the day.

Just remember to toast the bread first.

Golden Bread
(Watkins Cookbook, The J.R. Watkins Co., 1935)

1 cup milk
1 lightly-beaten egg
2 tablespoons sugar
5slices bread
3/4 teaspoon salt
Grease for griddle

Beat the egg, add salt, sugar, milk, and mix thoroughly, soak the slices of bread and bake on hot greased griddle until brown on both sides, then serve with maple syrup or jelly. This makes a delicious dessert served with jam.