Why do we say that a French toast is lost?
Why do we say that a French toast is lost?
There are strange names for it in the French culinary lexicon, and French toast is no exception. It's true, why say that a loaf is lost?
An egg, milk, a little vanilla sugar… All you have to do is dip your stale bread or your brioche a few days old in it, pan-fry everything and you're done! You will have recognized it, the French toast recipe could not be simpler and very practical for gourmets on a small budget. On the other hand, its name is very strange…
Inexpensive and ideal for consuming stale bread, the preparation has been very often used by the working classes over the centuries. It allows them not to throw away food for economic reasons or for religious connotations. The recipe, as we know it today, only appears from the 17th century. Until then a dish for the poor, French toast was increasingly appreciated by aristocrats and even became one of Henri IV's favorite dishes.
It is this enthusiasm that allows the recipe to be exported all over the world, especially in Canada and the United States where the Irish settlers went into exile after the Great Famine. They are also the ones who gave it the name “French toast”. Attention, nothing to do with a recognition of French culinary prowess because "to French" means in old Irish "to slice". The name has since endured because the French reference gave a refined air to the dessert (and thus allowed to increase its selling price).
As for the French "pain perdu", there are two possible explanations. The first would simply come from the fact that the recipe made it possible not to throw away bread and thus not lose it. The second explanation would have to do with the fact that they were eaten on the first Monday after Epiphany, a “lost” day off. In Flanders, we speak of “gewonnen brood” or “earned bread”… since it is not wasted!
