Sometimes you just want something on toast. Something hot, soft and interesting atop a raft of thickly cut bread and toasted until the topping blisters and is framed with crisp, lightly singed crusts.
Well made, “something on toast” is a snack of perfect contrasts. It’s why cheese on toast works so well. This week, I made a Welsh rabbit (the term rarebit came along much later) using an unusual method which involved soaking the bread in a cheese and beer mixture. When the bread had sponged up all the smoky notes from the cheese (I used a smoked cheddar) and the beer and mustard, I baked it in the oven for 20 minutes. The result, crisp on the outside, deliciously silky within, was so good we ate two rounds each. The method will please anyone who avoids this superb snack because they can’t be bothered to stir the beer and cheese and mustard until it thickens. If it ever does.
There were crab toasts, too. As savoury as you could imagine, with a little parmesan, chilli and freckles of chive among the rust and white flesh of the crab. The brown and white meats were made into a thick spread and finished under the grill. Expensive, yes, but anything with crab is never going to be an everyday treat.
I have always used sandwiches as a resting place for fridge leftovers – the juicy bits of roast chicken that lurk under the bird, an end of cheese, grated and softened with cream. This week a few slices of beef made it into a splendid toasted sandwich with beetroot, horseradish and some soft cream cheese.
Anything that sits on top of toast is best served with something seasonal, cool and crunchy. A cucumber salad in the case of the crab toasts; a red cabbage and russet apple salad for the baked rabbit. Suddenly a mere snack becomes a meal. So much more than just “something on toast”.
Baked Welsh rabbit
A new way with a much-loved old favourite. A full-flavoured cheese is needed here.
Serves 2
bread 4 thick slices
white beer 150ml
single cream 250ml
smoked cheddar 250g
Dijon mustard 1 tbsp
grain mustard 1 tbsp
Put the beer, cream, grated cheddar and mustards in a pan and warm through, stirring until the cheese has melted. Set the oven at 200C/gas mark 6. Place the slices of bread in the cream and cheese and leave for five minutes, gently pressing the bread down into the cream. Put the cream-soaked bread in a nonstick roasting tin and bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes. Serve with cabbage and apple salad (below).
Cabbage and apple
In a large bowl, mix together 1 tbsp of red-wine vinegar, a little lemon juice and 2 tbsp of olive oil. Shred 200g of red cabbage and add to the dressing. Slice the apple thinly, then toss with the red cabbage and its dressing.
Parmesan crab toasts
Folding the mixture together briefly will keep the texture rougher and more interesting.
Makes 2
crabmeat 150g, white and brown
chilli 1, medium sized
chives 3 tbsp
double cream 2 tbsp
parmesan 75g, finely grated
sourdough bread 2 thick slices
Put the crabmeat into a bowl. Halve the chilli lengthways, remove and discard the seeds, then chop the flesh finely and add to the crab. Finely chop the chives, then add them, with a little black pepper, to the crab, pour in the cream, add half of the grated parmesan and mix gently. Toast the bread on both sides, then spread with the crab mixture. Scatter the remaining parmesan over the top and cook under a heated overhead grill until bubbling and golden. Serve with the cucumber salad below.
Cucumber salad
Make a dressing by mixing together 2 tbsp of olive oil, 1 tbsp of white-wine vinegar and 1 tsp of Dijon mustard. Lightly peel then halve a quarter of a large cucumber, remove the seeds and roughly chop the flesh. Fold the cucumber into the dressing and serve with the crab toasts.
Beetroot, beef and horseradish
A handsome use for leftover roast beef. Good with roast pork, too, though you might want to swap the grated horseradish for a little finely shattered and salted pork crackling.
Makes 2 sandwiches
cream cheese 200g
raw beetroot 1 small
capers 1 tsp
horseradish 2 tbsp, freshly grated
cold roast beef 100g, thinly sliced
rye bread 4 small slices
olive oil a little
Put the cream cheese into a mixing bowl. Peel the beetroot and grate it coarsely into the cream cheese, but don’t stir. Add the capers, salt and black pepper and half the horseradish. Fold the beetroot very lightly into the mixture. Spread two slices of the bread with the cream cheese, then add the thin slices of roast beef. Dust the beef generously with salt, pepper and the remaining grated horseradish. Place the remaining bread on top of the beef.
Warm the oil in a nonstick frying pan. Place the sandwiches in the pan and let them cook briefly until the bread is lightly toasted, carefully turn and cook the other side, then serve.
Email Nigel at nigel.slater@observer.co.uk or visit theguardian.com/profile/nigelslater for all his recipes in one place. Follow Nigel on Twitter @NigelSlater
