Our 68th slice of toast - Cashew butter

Now we've all heard of peanut butter. But cashew butter - now that's a different story, altogether! But cashew butter - now that's a different story...

Unfortunately, CB hasn't made it to the consumer level that PB has achieved, possibly due to the cost of production or something similarly boring. This therefore causes the price to be much higher and we could only find it readily available from Meridian (shopped at Sainsbury's). But this was certainly worth every penny and many a curious finger has since been dipped in the jar to sample its glory.

The consistency was much smoother than even the smoothest PB and spread wonderfully upon our slices. On initial taste, it is difficult to distinguish between the cashew and the peanut, but what lies ahead is an aftertaste of pure cashew wonderment. It is also extremely sticky in the mouth, managing to cling around the tongue, roof of the mouth and gums. This should probably warrant some sort of warning label but on the plus side, you are left with an extended experience. We recommend that you fork out the extra dollar for a change of nut in your butter.

Our 67th slice of toast - Cottage cheese and hummus

2 soft toppings on the same slice of toast. We went for opposing orders with Grace choosing a cottage cheese follows hummus and myself choosing cottage cheese followed by hummus. Grace certainly chose the better option here. It would seem that I forgot how soft cottage cheese is - a rather useless foundation.

The topping was nice though. We like both hummus and cottage cheese and there were no apparent clashes to note. It does seem as though you're just putting on more topping than is necessary with this one though as they are of similar consistency and neither taste particularly powerful. It might just be worth keeping them separate so to appreciate each one alone instead.

Our 66th slice of toast - PB and onion

Grace now has a bulk 2.26kg peanut butter supply - quite silly. But necessary. Today, we were combining it with sliced raw onion. Red onion was the obvious contender. Does anyone have raw white onion? It's a bit harsh on the face. It doesn't just attack the taste buds does it - it soaks through the top of the mouth and gets all behind the face and then flows out through the nose whilst you are left crying in to the chopping board, cook's knife in hand considering just ending it all. Not nice.

So we popped it on and found this to be a potential double danger. Consumers of this slice run the risk of suffering from both the chin slap dangle (CSD) or upwards face slap (UFS). And during the eating procedure, I myself became a victim of the UFS, whilst Grace herself became a victim of the CSD. Between us, we were able to take these hits to raise awareness for all you PB and onion toasters out there. The topping was nice though, I found the onion complemented the peanuts quite well. Grace didn't like it at she detests raw onions in any shape or form. Not that they taste different with shape, unlike sandwiches which obviously taste better in triangles. She says she would have liked it if it was onion chutney, but that's competely different. So a silly thing to say really.

Our 65th slice of toast - Spam

If someone was to offer you spiced ham, you would probably accept their gracious offer. If however that person was to offer you Spam, you would inevitably decline their equally gracious offer. It hasn't achieved a great name over the years since its inception in 1937 and I'm sure its name doesn't do it any favours. Perhaps this is just because of the term used for junk emails, or for people with large foreheads at school. In either case the name isn't pretty and Grace has been in fear of this topping since day 1 of our adventure. I do have to mention though, that in containing 89% pork, that's 11% more than the Sainsbury's basics ham slices we had previously with our hawaiian slice.

I decided to go for the original recipe rather than reduced salt of added 'bacon' bits varieties. It was quite difficult to remove from the can as it was very compact. I also microwaved it as thing are often better hot. I didn't allow Grace to skimp on this topping and she filled her slice willingly. I wasn't dreading this much as I believe I'd had Spam fritters in the past and they weren't half bad, and the slice wasn't bad either. Even Grace found to her surprise that she didn't actually hate it. I tried not to wear my 'told you so' face after insisting it wouldn't be so bad. Clearly names aren't everything. Don't judge a tin of Spam by its cover.

Our 64th slice of toast - Raspberry cheesecake

So after our moderately disappointing baby food slice, we needed something to lift our toast dependant spirits and what better than a glorious pudding slice. Cheesecakes of course are usually made from a buttery biscuit base, a term made popular by the combination of Gregg Wallace, Swede Mason and Youtube - Masterchef Synesthesia. Now we couldn't just go chucking a buttery biscuit base on toast. Thats a double base. We'll leave that to the heavy metal.

This toasty cheesecake consisted of a liberal helping of mascarpone cheese, raspberries placed on top and a drizzling of honey over the top. It was incredible. Grace found herself so lost in this tiny toast adventure that she ate in to a meeting, pun intended, thus running off slice in hand. She later informed me of those at the meeting's amazement and inevitable envy at what she had brought along to eat.

This worked brilliant and the transportability proven by Grace has to give it 1 up on the buttery biscuit base!

Our 63rd slice of toast - PB & raisin and prune baby food

No, you didn't read the title incorrectly and I was the culprit who awkwardly foraged through the baby aisle of Sainsbury's in search of any baby food containing prune. It had to contain prune, see. The only product I could find was this. Raisin and prune baby brekkie. Thanks Ella. The packet informed us that this was for those of at least 6 months only, so Grace and I both qualified for this. The 'brekkie' itself was actually a yoghurt and tasted predominantly of raisin, but not in a particularly good way. Those poor kids.

Fortunately, the Skippy PB was able to mask some of the taste, enabling us to finish the slice ok but we didn't go lightly on he baby food. I certainly wouldn't recommend this. Leave it for the kids. Or better still, leave it on the shelf so Ella might rethink her range. On the plus side, it does spread well, but I am yet to find yoghurt that doesn't. It's really no wonder children cry so much. Perhaps we should all consider feeding them something else.

Our 62nd slice of toast - PB and chocolate (Reese's pieces!)

Anyone who loves peanut butter just must love reese's pieces. It's a simple law really. If you haven't tried them, finish reading this post then drop everything and run to your nearest shop to buy some! They are incredible. So inevitably, Grace and I couldn't wait to get this one going. We purchased a Cadbury's Flake as our chocolate of choice. These bars of pure flakey chocolate pleasure should have a warning label for guaranteed extreme mess on the packet. We used this usual con to our advantage and crumbled the life out of it before opening an end and pouring over the PB.

So we were back on the large tub of Skippy's extra crunchy PB followed by the chocolate pour. We then toasted another slice and laid it immediately on top of the chocolate layer, causing it to melt slightly. We reluctantly yet generously decided to share half each with our friends Miss Kerryanne and Mr Rob. All of us loved it. Much less sweet than Reese's pieces due to the choice of PB, but by no means a disappointment. The topping/filling worked well with the savoury crunch of the toast and I quite literally demand that you try it.

Our 61st slice of toast - Olives and feta cheese

Olives can be a pricey treat, though I do love them. I never used to though, mind. I tried some little blackn's in The Gambia when I was 6 and hated them. Now, since forcing them upon myself, I can't get enough and they are even making a regular appearance in Grace's life of late. We bought this fanciful little fruit from our local Co-Operative, in a small container consisting of both the green and black variety and already mixed with feta cheese and some sunflower oil.

I've had these boxes before and they show no hostility to the toast. A great slice with a Mediterranean feel that I thoroughly enjoyed. I'm not sure whether you could class Grace as being at the 'enjoyment' stage just yet, but by jove she is getting there.





We've even included a dramatic closeup for added expression.

I recently learned that feta cheese is made from a mixture of goat's cheese and sheep's cheese. That gives the littler grass munchers one over on the cows!

Our 60th slice of toast - Ham and pineapple

One of my favourite take away pizza toppings has to be Hawaiian – ham and pineapple. I find that pineapple adds a great sharp sweetness to savoury foods such as sweet and sour Chinese and pizza and this doesn’t differ within the toast realms. During unintentional market research, I couldn't believe the number of people that felt pineapple was out of its depth taking part in savoury dishes. They're damn wrong.

We went for a cheap ham product from the Sainsbury’s basics range, consisting of just 78% pork which is more meat than Billy Bear. It still tasted quite hammy too. The pineapple was also from the Sainsbury’s basics range, tinned and already chopped for a much appreciated added convenience.

Grace opted for laying a couple slices of ham down as a base, followed by a pineapple scatter. This proved to be an efficient method of avoiding the toast becoming too soggy under the juicy pineapple. I on the other hand opted for an all over scatter, ripping the ham in to shreds. Unfortunately, the 20% water content of the ham proved quite unstable, thus culminating in a rather flopped result. In any case, the flavour dispersion was great. We both enjoyed this.

Our 59th slice of toast - Put down egg

During Easter a few years back, I told my mother not to buy me a chocolate egg as I find that once I’ve started I will eat all the chocolate within my vicinity leaving myself feeling rather sick. So instead, she got me an ostrich egg. The following year was a selection of duck, quail, goose etc. And of all of them, chicken eggs tasted the best. So stick with them as there is no prize for egg adventure.

So we’re back with the egg, this time in the form of boiled egg. An easy thing to achieve by chucking some eggs in to a pan of boiling water and leave it for some time. And by chucking, I mean placing gently with a slotted spoon so not to burn your hands). You can even cook a batch for the week. I left mine for about 5 minutes, giving me a semi soft yolk. Personally, I’m not a big fan of overcooked hardboiled eggs, so this was good.

Grace really struggled with removing the shell from her egg and it almost became scrambled egg right there in her hands. She had some shell left in there once it finally made it on to the toast but she claimed this just adds to the crunch. The cold boiled egg worked well mashed down on some hot toast.

Our 58th slice of toast - Pumpkin pie filling

Our second topping today is another American one. Pumpkin pie filling – though I believe they usually put theirs in pastry. We don’t do that. We put ours on toast. So rather than buying a whole pumpkin from one of those many shops that don’t sell pumpkins outside of Halloween, you can buy a tin of Libby’s 100% pure pumpkin. This tin has existed unchanged since 1950, as has the recipe on the back for the famous pumpkin pie. And here is the recipe:

¾ cup granulated sugar

1 tsp ground cinnamon

½ tsp salt

½ tsp ground ginger

¼ tsp ground cloves

2 large eggs

1 can Libby’s 100% pure pumpkin

1 can Nestle Carnation evaporated milk

The method for the filling pretty much consists of just mixing it all together.

We didn’t enjoy this at all. It looked strange, felt strange and tasted quite strange too. This may have something to do with the following: I’d ran out of sugar; I couldn’t be bothered to grind the cloves; I had no evaporated milk – I quite dominant ingredient. Thus, we didn’t really try the recipe as intended so we can’t say what its like. But if you do have a tin of Libby’s 100% pure pumpkin but no sugar, cloves or evaporated milk, then I wouldn’t recommend making pumpkin pie.

Our 57th slice of toast - PB and Bacon

An all American classic on the menu today – peanut butter and bacon. Our company has also been graced by a new rather large pot of PB. Due to the regular occurrence of peanut butter, we decided to purchase a 1.13kg (40oz) Skippy extra crunchy peanut butter tub from the local wholesalers (Costco). That should last us a little while.

We visited our company café for the toast and bacon, escorting the PB tub with us. It would seem that large tubs of consumables draw much attention from local wanderers and I was surprised to hear the lack of expectation most of them had for the outcome of this combo. Well after achieving some free bacon for confusing the café staff, we piled it all on and found it to be a great success. A knife and fork is recommended to avoid the CSD and to make you look civilised. PB and bacon is no peasant’s dish.

Our 56th slice of toast - Hawaiian coconut spread

Here we have another home made homemade recipe, with a tropical twist. Neither Grace nor I have been to Hawaii, so couldn't tell you whether or not this is what it tastes like. But we can tell you that it has a crazy spelling. I present to you the ever complicated and precise recipe:

• Cream cheese
• Apricot jam
• Flaked coconut

I mixed the cream cheese and jam until I found a well matched juxtaposition. I then added quite a lot of coconut - bordering on getting too much stuck in your teeth for a comfortable toast experience. Grace didn't feel that there was enough coconut taste, but I assured her she wouldn't have wanted more. Perhaps some coconut extract would have been a welcoming addition. But even then, we weren't convinced by the apricot and cream cheese flavours. It was generally quite rich and Grace found that she had overloaded her slice. We hope Hawaii doesn't taste like this, because that just doesn't sell it to us. We'll stick with thoughts of hula's and ukulele's.

Our 55th slice of toast - Pear spread

This was a homemade topping which was, as previously suggested, made at home. This is a kind of marmalade type recipe and it was suggested that I store it in jars and process in a water bath. Well I skipped this step as I wanted to eat it the next day. Plus, I don't have any grandchildren to impress with my marvelous marmalade making mastery. So this was just a 'spread'.

The ingredients were as follows:

• 2 pears, cored and sliced
• Half an unpeeled lemon, thinly sliced
• Some sugar
• Some honey
• Enough water to produce the desired consistency
• Some fresh rosemary

I pride myself on precise quantities. I also purchased my very own rosemary plant that I now keep proudly on my windowsill. I may even buy a mini watering can.

The spread was quite disappointing. The pear and honey would have worked well as a pear sauce (much like your standard apple sauce) but this had lemon rind in it which, despite being less sharp post-cooking than raw, still hit too hard. Neither of us are big fans of rindy marmalade. But for the rindy marmalade fan - who knows.

Our 54th slice of toast - Cream cheese, apple & cinnamon

The cinnamon is back! And so is the cream cheese! And so is the apple, though he hasn't appeared much. This apple was a 'red apple' from the Co-Op. Not very useful, but it was nice and juicy. I think we all know that cinnamon and apple are like two pea's in a pod. Actually they're nothing like pea's wherever they are, but the saying still stands.

We opted for sliced apples, using a table knife and self-taught cutting actions. Grace isn't allowed to use knives for cutting because it isn't safe. She forgets she's holding things and oh, there goes the finger. We don't have time for that sort of tomfoolery, we've got toast to eat. We laid the apple slices over the cream cheese, slightly overlapping at the edges. We then sprinkled on the cinnamon and no, I didn't forget my stencil.

The slice tasted great, but we did encounter a problem, dubbed the upwards face slap (UFS). This is the opposite to the chin slap dangle (CSD) discussed in previous blog slices 30 and 37. It was Grace who confronted the problem head on when she bit in to the edge of an apple slice which then proceeded to flip upwards, hitting her in the face. IN THE FACE. Talking of faces, we made one from the remaining apple, its sticker and 2 blueberries. I hope you like it.

Our 53rd slice of toast - Cream cheese & blueberries

You will find blueberries in almost any health magazine under the 'superfoods' section. Unfortunately, this does not mean that they can fly nor shoot lasers from their eyes, though i'm sure they would if they had eyes. They can however wear capes but you would have to supply them with these. Despite this lack of super hero abilities they are still a pricey fruit, so we were lucky to get them at half price.

So for such luxury, we could only have chosen the greatest cream cheese in all the land - Philadelphia. Together, they made a taste concoction of pure bliss. Grace even stated, "my favourite one yet". I personally disagree, but I think I am driven by the surprise factor and I was expecting this one to be amazing, which it was.

The cream cheese also acts as a fantastic cement for building blueberry towers. Mother always told you not to play with your food. Don't listen to her. You build those towers.