Oct 23 2005
How to Cook Toutons
This is the first cooking video posted to Steel White Table. It’s called Toutons: The Steak of Breads (Google Video), or This Ain’t No Martha Stewart Touton. It was recorded this morning with my friend, Mike. Jenny was behind the camera. It’s the first in a series of cooking videos called Sunday Morning Scoff with Phillip and Mike featuring foods from Newfoundland.
Toutons are a type of fried bread I’ve had only in Newfoundland. I’m not posting a recipe, because if you know how to make plain old white bread (though a bit of whole wheat probably wouldn’t hurt), then you know how to make toutons. This video demonstrates the actual cooking of the toutons, as well as the eating of them.
Next week we plan on making some figgy duff, a Newfoundland delicacy Mike and I know well.
Recipe Update (Nov. 20/05): If you know how to make bread, then you know how to make toutons. However, if you want a recipe geared more towards making good toutons than bread, here it is (it’s one of many possible touton recipes):
Ingredients: 3/4 tbsp yeast; 3 cups of flour; 1 egg; 2 tbsp sugar; 1 bottle of beer. Mix ingredients together, knead and let rise. Then cook ‘em as per my instructional video and you’re good to go.
Next time on Sunday Morning Scoff: Fish Cakes.
I think it’s akin to blacks and the word “nigga!” even newfies themselves use it, but they do tend to get offended if someone else uses the word!
Toutons, in my experience, aren’t cooked in oil but rather in pork fat or butter and are much smaller and thicker and are allowed to rise when they cook. My family usually just makes them about 3 or 4 inches across and are sometimes almost an inch thick. I would suggest going to a local restaurant like Velma’s or Classic Cafe to see how they cook theirs.
I don’t think that ‘Newfie’ is not percieved as a derogatory term anymore. Why do so many of those who visit here go downtown to be ‘Screeched In’, to become honorary Newfoundlanders. People used to take offense to ‘newfie jokes’ but I would like to believe that we are beyond that.
I deleted the original ‘Newfie’ comment and my response to it, because it’s no fun going there. But I do know plenty of Newfoundlanders who are not fond of the term.
damnit, what happened to the posts i was responding to!?
oh, so the newfie did it!
hey phil I think the difference between pancakes and bread dough is that one is a levened dough (bread dough)…we had these in Glace Bay as kids, they were thicker and always done in bacon grease….none of that “eytalian oliver oil”..although there was a number of Italian families in the area…stange as that may sound…an Italian version of fried dough is crostoli which is sweetened and often the dough had a splash or three of grappa…keep up the cooking …. soon you too will be famous enough to thwart customs and come to canada to sit in a hollowed out pumpkin…oh the newfie thing..here where I am in ontario it is always said as a derogative slur by the locals…I have little recollection of it having the same connotation when i was growing up out east…it tended to be more humourous..teasing in a fun way….could be I just did not notice…too “stunned as me arse”
What the fuck, newfie isn’t a derogatory word, it just takes too bloody long to say “newfoundlander”. Just like australian is shortened to aussie. I’m sure they really take offense to it! Cause like.. IT’S SHORTER! OH NO! That’s like calling someone named Christopher “Chris”. I’d beat the face off anyone who shortened my name cause it’s soooo disrespectful!
Where do you think 99% of newfie jokes originate? Newfoundland! They’re more easy going than given credit for..
I know a lot of Newfoundlanders and I never heard of anyone being offended by the term “newfie”. “Newfie”s use “mainlanders” in the same manner. I don’t think it’s like “nigger”, which is often used by idiots as a racial slur. Well, maybe it is. If so, it’s news to me and I lived in Newfoundland for over 10 years.
Great, this is becoming a discussion about the term “Newfie.” Aren’t we forgetting the most important thing here, the toutons? Newfie jokes are degrading to Newfoundland culture, and when you say Newfie, you might as well be saying, “Stupid Newfie.” Lots of people go along with it, including plenty of Newfoundlanders, but I suspect there are just as many who don’t — who still have a good sense of humour.
Wikipedia’s entry on the term ‘Newfie.’
Jody, the word “nigga” is a somewhat friendly term blacks use amongst each other. like “yo Jody, mah nigga!” nigger is certainly the derogatory form of it. nigga = my friend, nigger = my enemy, in a quite literal translation. at least that’s what it’s like in the seedy rap underworld that i subject myself to on a daily basis through my headphones! However, us white folk could never be caught saying either word! that shit gets you killed, yo. :/
Here’s how I eat toutons (not those furry kangaroos from Hoth):
- pierce the crusty top with a fork, making lots of holes
- spread butter (not margarine) all over it (the touton HAS to be warm)
- spread a thin layer of molasses over it
- eat with fork and steak knife
Go on, give ‘er a go.
> Newfie jokes are degrading to Newfoundland culture, and when you say Newfie, you might as well be saying, “Stupid Newfie.”
I declare shenanigans on you, do you accept this declaration of shenanigans?
It’s not degrading to NEWFIE culture, it freakin’ exemplifies how easy going their culture is. Getting all uppity about it is very anti-newfie and I anti-salute you.
I started this. I innocently used the term “[censored]” in some feedback I gave Phillip regarding how a true [censored] would cook and eat toutons. A Newfoundlander eats his toutons cooked in a pan well soaked in butter (or pork fat, I’ve learned) and typically eats it with his fingers, not a fork and knife. Actually, putting more butter on a warm touton is common, and using syrop (nowadays, Aunt Jemima, but when I grew up, no-name corn syrop) is acceptable.
As a [censored] myself, I am flattered that my dignity and honour would be so fiercely defended and debated over the use of the term. I can certainly understand someone’s distaste for a term often used to ridicule.
I can’t friggin’ wait for when Phillip cooks scrunchions!
Sunday, October 30th. We made fish cakes for today’s episode of “Sunday Morning Scoff,” but it quickly became a lesson on how NOT to make fish cakes. Technically, you could eat them… if you had to. But they were far from what I’d call the ideal fish cake.
Also (and this always happens), as we made this an official series of instructional videos, it was no fun. It’s only fun when it happens on its own natually. No more declarations of ‘a new series’ of audio magazines, videos, etc. That kills it every time.
I’ll see what I can do with the fish cake footage. I might post something in a day or two. Kind of busy right now.
Never did I hear, nor see, a better display of Newfoundland quizine^%^%$#
My Mom never used beer nor yeast in Toutons. She used backing powder,so it rised in the pan while frying, and there was no need to “need” the dough.
Great video, you shurely don’t have any dogs, or Mike’s Touton would have been claimed by them.
Robert Critch
Thinking of Home(Botwood, NFLD.)
As for the Newfie stuff. I believe all Newfie jokes are made by Newfoundlanders, because most “mainlanders” don’t know enough about us to make any jokes. ;-)
I think “Newfie” is fine for those that use it affectionately, but I do recall being insulted when about 15 years ago, a Broadcaster said,”The Newfie’s are having an election”. I think the “nigger” comment is quite true, truely offensive when a non-black person uses the term, because of the roots in racism.
Robert Critch
Thinking of Home(Botwood, NFLD.)again
I’ve never known anyone to add beer to their touton dough, but I don’t know anyone who deliberately made dough just for toutons. It was always leftover dough from making bread. But I was getting requests for a recipe, so I posted the first one I found.
Everything else in the Sunday Morning Scoff videos was a disaster. I don’t expect there will be any more. The first one was spontaneous and fun. But it’s hard to maintain that quality once you start planning what you’re going to do.
So we’re never going to see Cauliflower Popcorn?!
I doubt it.
philomena hey make the cauliflower…we just call it roasted cauliflower..it is dead easy and it does make the vegtable have a nutty flavor…if you do like it you can play with spices to suit your own tastes…i have added cayenne …was okay..i like with just olive oil and salt… come on do some more scoff….do something with molasses…in newfoundland it is not just for the kitchen…
haha, what the hell do newfies do with molasses outside the kitchen? does it have….bedroom purposes? :/
Its only some people who get up in arms about the word Newfie, I personally don’t mind it as long as its used affectionately, Some people spit it out like its a dirty word, with the intent of it being derrogatory. Historically it can be traced back to being used by Canadian (remeber it was before NFLD became a Canadian Province) and American Soldiers who arrived at American Army bases situated in Gander, Stephenville and St. Johns. They looked down upon Newfoundlanders and used the Term “Newfie” or “Newf” as a derrogatory term for the townsfolk.
Mainland Canada’s recent disdain for Newfoundland and the fact that they are increasingly looking down upon Newfoundland as a “Welfare province” is what gets Newfoundlanders so touchy about the word “Newfie”…
I think that making toutons is very cool
: Brian
Hey, You stole my Grandmothers recipe! She was French Canadian and called them gullats or similar. Haven’t heard or had them for over 40 years- gonna happen tomorrow though! Too late now but, didn’t I see the face of Christ on that second Tauton that hit the floor? JT
I’m a newfie and i don’t take offence to the term! it’s part of our tradition..were newfies! And toutans are the best thing in the world! i think there simmilar to the “beaver tails” they sell on the mainland only toutans been around for alot longer… i bet toutans would be wicked with conectioners sugar and chocolate hazelnut spreas (nutella) :)
oh jesus.. newfie isn’t a derogatory term at all.
Just wanted to drop you a note to say thanks! I am an Americian (don’t hold that against me) and I got the chance to live in Newfoundland as a young teen for almost 5 years back in the early 70’s. My mom is a Newfie so that makes me half. Living there I got the chance to really “live” my Newfoundland roots. Some of my most memorable times were just listening to the many stories my great-grandmother would tell about St. John’s at the turn of the century. I hold those memories very close to my heart.
One memory your website brought back was when my mom showed us what her mom used to do with the extra bread dough she had earlier set aside. She would flatten balls of dough by hand and fry them up in a pan and my brothers and sister and I would smoother them in butter and strawberry jam and dig in! What a treat! Something so simple yet so delicious!
With the many years that have passed I had forgotten all about toutons until an hour ago when I was surfing the web and I came across a Newfie who said come home to The Rock to find out what it is. I googled “Newfie toutons” which brought me to you. Listening to your voices on the video brought a flood of memories and a warm feeling to my heart. I now sit and reminisce and thank the powers that be that I got a chance to be immersed in the spirit of Newfoundland and its people who make it the treasure it is. That special something that needs to be experienced. Just ask any of the hundreds of passengers who landed in Gander and St. John’s on the morning of September 11th.
Thanks for the memories!
Randy B.
Here’s a recent scoff. Not 100% original (baby carrots?) but true to form. Note the still unclaimed prize from “5 words”.
The kids and I made toutons yesterday from leftover wholewheat bread dough. Lots of butter, which I mixed with olive oil to prevent burning, then once cooked, smothered with molasses and more butter. Excellent..
Toutons, my kids love them!!!!. My youngest son is taking the recipe to school for class project. They are putting together a recipe book of old family favorites. Well of course he wanted his favorite TOUTONS!!! He may not have been born in Newfie like me but he is a true one at heart lol. Gotta have them toutons!!!