I wish you had added the option for never tried one. I voted for “what is it?”, although I did read a description of it on a diner menu. It didn’t sound good to me.
The KFC Double Down is basically a Monte Cristo, but with fried chicken instead of french toast.
I used to love the french toast style ones at my college cafeteria. It’s a perfect marriage, egg, ham, cheese, & bread, all things that taste good together, cooked together.
Deep fried? WTF? That’s not a monte cristo, it’s just a deep fried sandwich.
I’ve been making something like this for years out of leftover buffet sandwiches, not knowing it had a name.
I’m actually indifferent to it. It’s fine, but I won’t go out of my way for one. I’d rather just have a good croque monsiuer (or croque madame if I’m feeling like egg.)
A monte cristo is not supposed to be the same thing as french toast. The fact that so many restaurants can’t understand this is why they’re screwing up monte cristos.
French toast is supposed to be sweet and flavored with cinnamon and nutmeg and stuff like that. You can serve it with maple syrup or jelly if you want.
But a monte cristo is not supposed to be sweet. It’s a sandwich not a dessert. Ham, turkey, and swiss cheese are not dessert ingredients. Adding sugar, spices, syrup, or jelly to a monte cristo is like adding peanut butter to a reuben.
Wikipedia jibes with my view that the deep frying is a traditional characteristic of the Cristo:
Variations sound interesting, but the deep fried technique makes it unique among all the other sandwiches I eat.
Fried, yes. But not deep fried.
I’ve never seen a deep fried monte cristo.
The Wikipedia article does claim that a monte cristo is “traditonally” deep fried. But then go read the sources they cite about the history of the sandwich.
Stradley’s “History of Monte Cristo Sandwich” in What’s Cooking America says “the basic sandwich is two slices of white bread containing ham, turkey, or chicken, and a slice of cheese are dipped in beaten egg and fried in butter” and “Most food historian generally think that the Monte Cristo sandwich is a variation of a French dish called Croque Monsieur. This original grilled cheese sandwich consisted of Gruyere cheese and lean ham between two slices of crust-less bread, fried in clarified butter. It was originally served in 1910 in a Paris cafe. This sandwich is still a popular snack or casual meal throughout France and Switzerland in most bars and cafes. It is usually made in a special sandwich grilling iron consisting of two hinged metal plates, each with two shell-shaped indentations.” And Stall and Spalding’s “The Monte Cristo Sandwich” in The Encyclopedia Of Guilty Pleasures: 1,001 Thing You Hate To Love described it as “basically a ham and/or turkey sandwich dredged in egg batter and fried in a skillet”.
Stradley’s book also offers the information that while the sandwich dates back to 1910, it became trendy when it became a featured menu item at the Blue Bayou and Tahitian Terrace restaurants in Disneyland in 1966. And the Disneyland recipe, which is cited, specifices deep frying with jelly on the side.
So all the people who think a monte cristo is supposed to be deep fried and served with jelly have been fooled by the Mickey Mouse version. A real monte cristo is pan-fried in butter with no sweet stuff.
Man was I misled. My school cafeteria, the first place I really came across this, billed as a Monte Cristo what amounted to a grilled/pressed Reuben – pastrami, kraut, cheese, pressed in the sandwich press. This is the first I’m focusing on how wrong that apparently was.
Barry Popik’s take on the history of the sandwich. Listen to him–he’s the sandwich guru.
Looks like he agrees with Little Nemo, in that it is traditionally fried in butter, not deep fried.
The first reference to a deep fried monte cristo Popik cites was from 1970. And the first reference to serving one with jelly comes from 1968. Maybe Disneyland really did invent the deep fried monte cristo with jelly in 1966.
n/m. Misread post.
Never heard of such a thing. Is it more common in certain regions?
They both look delicious. I like them either way as long as there’s not a Kraft slice for cheese inside, but I prefer the deep fried variety…preferably with raspberry preserves for dipping.
Raspberry? Raspberry? Strawberry, dudette.
I’ve only had one in my life. I was working briefly in Memphis and we stopped in this place that was famous for them (Anyone?) on our way to Graceland and it was wonderful. Sounded awful, raspberry jelly on a fried sandwich, but I’d scarf a couple more given half a chance.
What Fenris says.
Holy crap! Who is Anissa?? After seeing the photo of the abomination she calls a Monte Cristo, and the comment, “Enjoy hot sandwich with currant or strawberry jelly” :eek:, I wouldn’t trust her instructions for boiling water!