The Origins of French Toast

It was all because of a conversation held with Elena at my very first Meetup of the Szczecin English Language Club.

In my ongoing quest to identify and experience authentically Polish... everything, from stores to foods, I had asked her which grocery stores are in fact Polish in origin.

I knew Auchan and Carrefour were French, and Lidl and Metro (Makro, here) were German, but I thought that Netto, Biedronka and other ubiquitous food outlets were genuine Polish commercial ventures.

“Netto is Danish” Elena averred, “and Biedronka is Portuguese.”

“Which stores are authentically Polish, then?” I queried.

Without hesitation, she uttered a word that sounded like ‘spoem’ and another name: Lewiatan.

I remembered seeing the latter brand, mostly in the outskirts of town, in smaller neighborhoods.

The first time I’d seen the sign, I chuckled because my dear friend Marjorie used to work for the east coast food distributor Giant and I wondered if their reach extended all the way to this little burg.

Leviathan, Giant... get it?

I have yet to tread into a Lewiatan; that will be a venture for another day.

The other store Elena mentioned, the one whose name sounded like ‘poem’ with an S in front of it, brought on far more questions: “What is a s-poem? Where can I find one?”

She was rather vague in her answers, stating that those stores’ sign script was weird and loopy and hard to read. As to where I could find such a store:

“They’re all over the place! Have you been to Manhattan?” she asked.

“The one in New York?” I rejoined – to which the group burst out laughing.

Clearly, I had exhausted that line of questioning and it was time to move on to other subjects. I tucked all of this new information in the back of my brain, to be researched in the morrow.

The meeting broke up shortly after 9PM. It was a delightful time except for having to counter the assertion that women simply aren’t fit for certain tasks.

The man making that claim had a lot of nerve broaching that subject to two independent females! It was difficult not to get heated about the whole subject; after all, it was only my first encounter with this group. I didn’t want to start an equality war right off the bat!

Seated next to me, I could sense Elena getting equally incensed... She and I did our best to refute his assertion without having to get ugly; thus a kinship was born.

The next morning, on the computer...

First, verify that Netto and Biedronka indeed belong to non-Polish entities. Next, find Manhattan and plan an excursion.      

Finding a web page under the search string ‘Manhattan Szczecin’ yielded a Facebook page that I couldn’t look at because I persistently refuse to Facebook. However, I lucked out: there was a map with Manhattan pinpointed and, in the image gallery, loads of pictures!

Come to find out, I had been to Manhattan before. Once, days after my arrival here in my fruitless search for Ikea, another time to catch bus 57 to where my insurance agent’s office is.

I just didn’t know what it was called Manhattan.

Manhattan Szczecin is a large, open-air mall. Traders barter anything from toothpaste and deodorant to freshly baked goods. Filled doughnuts being the local speciality, there were several stalls boasting those ooey-gooey treats. 

One vendor was selling Nutella-filled doughnuts that were as big as a plate! How I wanted one... but the line was too long. I ‘settled’ for two marmalade-filled treats from a smaller, less populated stand.

Moving on: clothes and produce, tobacconists; several empty stalls and a few being refurbished, no doubt in anticipation of the busy summer season ahead.

My circuitous path was meant to lead me to ‘s-poem’, which I had since learned was Społem (the L with the line through it makes the English W sound).  

When the name became clear during my computer detective work, I had to laugh: Społem was the very first grocery store I shopped at, the day I arrived here! Indeed, Elena was right: the script is very loopy and hard to read if you don’t know what you’re reading.

Because she had specifically mentioned this particular outlet – the Społem behind Manhattan, I thought that perhaps there must be something extraordinary at this store that one couldn’t find at any other outlet.

On my way there, I was accosted by exactly one beggar; she would not accept the fact that I couldn’t understand her. Continuously gesturing to her mouth – equipped with no more than 4 teeth, she aptly conveyed the impression that she wanted food.

A throwback to my China and America days, where beggars are much thicker on the ground: I offered to buy her something to eat rather than give her money (all of this was communicated through sign language). Most often, beggars want money, not food, no matter how long they say it’s been since they’ve eaten!

Offering to buy food usually gets me cussed out or left alone. I don’t mind helping the hungry to secure food – that’s why I offer to do so. I do resent handing over money to someone who may just have more money than I do, though, which was often the case in China.

After a bit of head shaking and finally relenting to come with me, this woman who looked authentically Gypsy plunged back into the mall at my heels.

Only then did I realize that the food stalls were in the opposite direction I wanted to travel, so I ‘found’ a 2 złoty coin in my pocket and handed it over. She went her way and I went mine.

A bit of a disappointment, that Społem. Not only was it smaller and more cramped than the one I had shopped at, but there was none of the charming disarray of special-offer products heaped in bins in the middle of the store.

That’s because there was Społem II: right next door, a store full of household goods (of dubious quality, I might add).

From fake flowers to bedding and everything in between, one might outfit an entire household and then some, from this store alone! In fact, it was in that store that I took the picture of the Hades grave polish.

I did buy a couple of things: Nivea hair milk – my hair continues to give me fits because I’ve not found the right shampoo for it. My hair insists on laying on my head like a dead thing and tangling worse than a pit of snakes!

I also bought a serrated knife to cut a loaf of bread I’ve had since last October.

The day after I had broken my arm, in pain and in fear of falling again, I eased myself down the five flights of stairs and shuffled to the nearest store, Biedronka, to buy a few staples that would last me at least a week – long enough to get over the worst of the pain in my arm.

Among the few things I picked up was a loaf of bread, unsliced. I didn’t think of how I would slice it at that time, I focused on the projection that that loaf would surely last me a week; ten days on the outside.

It was only after I got home that I realized, with one arm completely incapacitated and the other’s function reduced, I would have no way of slicing bread or anything else. I chucked the loaf into the freezer and there it remained until three weeks ago.

I now have full use of my arms but did not have a bread knife to cut this most resilient loaf. Hence the Społem purchase of a knife.

While that bread’s freshness is certainly out of the question, I thought it would do nicely for French toast, and that was the brunch I have afforded myself for the past three weekends, courtesy of a knife bought in an authentically Polish store.  

I have a thing about food being thrown out and do my best to never waste any food, hence my determination to eat this bread in spite of its age and hardness.

So, this entry concludes with the revelation of a remarkable, 7-month-old loaf of bread which, even though I pulled it from the freezer three weeks ago, has not moldered; only gotten harder.

Luckily, the serrated blade worked just like a saw, chewing its way through fossilized dough and crust, which sprang most deliciously back to life when soaked in a froth of beaten eggs and milk.

Bathed in a glow of satisfaction that I’ve not wasted any food, I popped the last bite of that bread in my mouth less than an hour ago.

That makes the origins of this French toast – what Britons call ‘eggy bread’ and what the French call ‘lost bread (pain perdu)’ October 2018, although the eggs and milk to make it with have much more recent dates.

You didn’t think I would be so arrogant as to believe you don’t know the true origins of French toast, did you?