Tosti Ham-Kaas

In my grandmother's second notebook, between the stewed pears and the pancakes, there is a page for things that are hardly recipes at all. A boiled egg. Bread fried in butter. A note to put cheese under the grill before it dries at the edges. This is where the tosti belongs: not among grand dishes, but among the small kitchen rescues that fed children after school, students before payday, and anyone who had bread getting tired in the tin.

The name is wonderfully plain. Tosti is the Dutch kitchen's borrowed little word for a toasted sandwich, and ham-kaas means exactly what it says: ham-cheese. No poetry hiding in the syllables this time. But let me tell you a secret: the plainness is the trick. The Dutch tosti is not trying to be a grand sandwich. It is white bread, a modest slice of ham, young Gouda that melts before it thinks too much of itself, and enough pressure to seal the edges so the cheese runs gold inside.

The method matters because there are so few places to hide. Butter the outside lightly, keep the cheese inside the bread rather than hanging over the edge, and press until the crust is crisp and the centre has yielded. Hou het altijd simpel, always keep it simple. Cut it diagonally, serve it with curry ketchup or mustard if your house demands it, and eat it while the seam is still molten enough to remind you that thrift, treated kindly, can be generous.