We recently bought a Breville Snack Creations toasted sandwich snack maker. It’s great – it makes four sandwiches using eight slices of bread in one go, enough for a meal for Jac and me. I love these sandwiches as they are a tasty, hot, savoury meal and so easy and quick to prepare. Here are a couple of feeds we’ve had.
Two kinds of sandwiches are pictured here: honey glazed ham, tomato and mustard; and more ham, mushroom, and mayonnaise.
And this was the very first toasting with the new toastie maker. I had chicken, swiss cheese and mayo in one, and fresh mushrooms and mayo in the other. The sandwiches closest to the front could’ve probably been toasted a little longer, but I take the blame for those – I let my impatience to eat get the better of me! Toastie makers are best not supervised by hungry, impatient people. :)
When I moved out of home at 18 to live in a tiny cat box of a flat with a high school friend, we practically lived on toasted sandwiches. My flatmate bought a Breville sandwich maker* that made two sandwiches a time, and it quickly became our most treasured appliance. Our toasted sandwiches revolved around these big packets of Watsonia sliced table ham – ham and cheese; ham and tomato; ham, cheese and tomato; and I liked ham, cheese and baked beans, and ham, cheese, tomato sauce, pepper and corn kernels. I remember on the first day we moved in, we realised we didn’t have a tin opener (we discovered this at the very moment we were just about to have our first meal and were looking to open a tin of spaghetti to have on toast!) …and then after we’d done the washing up, we realised we didn’t have any tea towels.
I also lived on instant noodles (Maggi chicken flavour and chicken and corn flavour two-minute noodles, and Indomie Mi Goreng) – but I still love to eat instant noodles now. I always have a five-pack of Maggi mee in the pantry (I always buy the Malaysian ones from the asian supermarket – I reckon they taste much nicer than the Australian ones from Woolies or Coles) and we still buy Indomie Mi Goreng by the carton from the asian supermarket. Jac likes the occasional Indomie meal. I cook up three packets between us and fry up a Chinese omelette (flavoured with soy sauce and white pepper), and it’s a very tasty meal.
I ate lots of baked beans and rice, and I liked to cook up a potato, slice it and quickly fry it in the wok with garlic and oyster sauce. Hmmm, not sounding that different to what I do now, eh?
But yes, what I ate most of when I first moved out of home were toasted sandwiches.
What did you eat a lot of when you first moved out of home?
*When I moved out of that flat a year later I bought my own Breville sandwich maker. It’s still being used, at Jac’s office! She makes toasted sandwiches with it all the time! Pretty impressive for an electrical appliance, considering I bought it when I was 19 or so, and am turning 34 in a few weeks.
I'm TFP, a food blogger from Perth, Western Australia.
{ 37 comments… read them below or add one }
When I first moved out it was straight into student housing. It was an apt but my fail roomate never got a job and would eat all my food while I was at art class so I would only buy things she couldn’t stand. Spaghettio’s (she couldn’t stand the smell) were one of the few things I could safely keep in the apt (and I could still eat them then). Id eat out for dinner most nights after work tho.
So yeah, Spaghettio’s and McDonalds non stop my first year away.
So, you’re what, 6 weeks older than I am? I’ll be 34 on 5/24. And I have an alarm clock even older than that toaster. They don’t make appliances like they used to!
The toastie pictures make me happy. I love toasted bread and melted cheese – meat choice is an afterthought by comparison, unless you’re talking about a really good burger.
When I moved out, I ate a lot of ramen noodles, which I still like, but not with the seasoning packets – either dressed up with my own creation or at a real ramen shop, of which there are many in the area I live in. I also ate a lot of Chef Boyardee Spaghetti-o’s (plain, with hot dogs, with meatballs). Ewwww hahaha.
The toasted sandwiches look great–I love that little bit of soft, cooked tomato peeking out! Do you put butter/olive oil on the bread before toasting it?
The first year I lived alone, I made a lot of stir fried chicken breast with onions/potatoes/broccoli over rice. It was pretty good, but also quite plain and I got really sick of it.
Now, instant noodles–that’s something I’m going to be eating for the rest of my life (much to the chagrin of my boyfriend, who thinks they are gross!).
When I first moved out I lived on frozen meatballs, pasta and jarred sauce. So cheap. My go-to alternative was canned tuna in all the glorious forms you can think of. At the recomendation of a friend I even tried tuna quesadillas… turns out tuna and cheese are not so lovely together.
Cereal was another item that always adorned the cabinets. That hasn’t changed though, cereal is still great all hours of the day!
I ate a lot of sandwiches and instant noodles… funny, i eat a lot of those too still :D
When I moved out of home into a flat similar in size to what you described (complete with green lino, orange/brown carpet and a cockroach infestation), I lived on those Continental packets – packet pasta and packet rice. I still eat them occassionally now! :)
I also used to have toasted sandwiches and lots of scrambled eggs on toast. And the day I learnt to make risotto from scratch was a blessing.
Being in Leederville near Oxford Street was also pretty good – lots of great, cheap(ish) restaurants and take-aways down there!!! :)
Instant noodles, and oh, Campbell’s Soup. Campbell’s Soup + pasta = amazing meal. How disgusting, now that I think of it, but occasionally I still get the student cravings.
I bought a house when I was 18! (it was back in 1984 when they were under $40,000k). I was only earning $18k a year and my repayments took up 60% of my weekly income. Back then lamb was cheap so I used to eat a lamb chop and a stir fry (made of mostly shredded cabbage with carrots and whatever else was cheap with heaps of garlic and a sprinkling of curry powder) every night. My weekly splurge was being able to buy 1 drink at the Sunday session! (or bat my eyelids a bit at the boys and score a free drink… if I was lucky! :)
I still love that quick to make, cheap vege stir fry today!
Here’s what we eat in the US in our first home away from home…ramen noodles (hopefully we put some vegies in or cut-up hot dogs), Quesadillas of all kinds (pretty much like your toasted sannies only on a flour tortilla), burritos, Mac’n Cheese, frozen pizza, bagels, toaster waffles, eggs, spaghetti, and Nachos. If we are too lazy to make Nachos we just have chips and salsa. I had a roomie once (guy) who considered beer, chips, and salsa to be the three major food groups. Now that I can actually cook, I still sometimes eat that kind ofcrap, and sometimes dinner is even Pop Secret Homestyle popcorn! I totally recommend instant oatmeal with a big scoop or two of Haagen-Dasz Gianduja ice cream on top instead of milk!
I live on rice with pesto and massive bunches of english spinach because i couldn’t afford meat!!
sweet potato with garlic and butter….actually i still eat all that stuff too.
when you dont HAVE to eat it anymore it tastes pretty good :-)
I am in the process of completing my first year out of my house. I eat tons of Annies boxed mac and cheese with any kind of vegetable that’s on sale thrown in. I’ve also picked up a taste for perogies with fried onions on top and ramen with kamaboko and konyaku tossed in with it. I don’t have any ideas of what else to make so I just rotate through these three things.
I was working in a restaurant when I moved out on my own, so I ate a lot of restaurant food…At home, if I absolutely could not get out of cooking, I made eggs, eggs, and more eggs. Eggs with chorizo in a tortilla with cheese…yum.
when i was studying in uni, I found the food sold on campus too pricey for my liking. So i subsisted on the following most of the time, because they were easy on my tiny pocket:
indomie mee goreng with a runny fried egg and canned fried dace in salted black beans . yummy scrummy comfort food that i indulge in from time to time :)
bak kut teh packets. We bought the spare ribs from a particular chinese butcher in northbridge. Great comfort food, esp during winter!
lebanese bread, with a sauteed mushroom and capscium accompaniment.$3 for a nice big loaf of bread was just great :)
and last but not least, plenty of SPAM!! fried with rice and/or egg or as part of a sammich with cheese. Oh, and may i add i only bought the Ma Ling brand of luncheon meat :)
When I first moved out of home I was a poor, poor uni student, and most of my meals were Mi Goreng (every student I know at these) with frozen peas or chip sandwhiches; potato chips (BBQ and salt and vinegar was best) in between two pieces of cheap white bread. A couple of these and I would be really full. Its funny to think that nowdays I wouldn’t touch any of these foods – I avoid eating any wheat.
Nice topic! I’ve moved out of home for a little more than a month and I’m starting to get the hang of things. I can’t get enough of toasted sandwiches either- as long as there’s cheese in the sandwich, it can’t possibly go wrong. Mi goreng is also awesome, as is salad with whichever vegetables are cheap that shopping trip.
As for combinations, you should try vegemite with avocado, or tomato, cheese and vegemite. Raw mushrooms sounds fantastic!
I lived in cologne for nearly two years, until I came back home for the last three semesters due financial reasons. I think, I mostly ate instant noodles or all kind of noodles with tomatosauce. This was, because noodles and tomato sauce is the cheapest food I was able to cook. ;D When I went home after those two years, I had lost about 20 pounds…
I lived opposite KFC! So lots of that!
Haha well damn, I’m still 16 (17 in a couple days) so I haven’t left home YET. I had to live alone for a month or so though in the summer, I had a lot of pizza, random fast food, and random scraps of meat cooked up and thrown into a tortilla.
I ate a lot of Campbell’s soup and sandwiches with nutella spread…I still eat a lot of those!
These look SO GOOD! I guess it’s sandwiches for dinner!
goddamn now *i* feel like having toasties. thanks a lot tfp :P
food’s more easily available in malaysia, even at night, so when i first started living on my own i just ate out a lot. nasi lemak, chicken siew yok rice, char koay teow (hello, clogged arteries!), pork noodles, and various mamak stall food. on those lazy nights or midnight oil burning for assignments, i usually have instant soup, assam laksa maggi, or indomie. :D
I had 2 staple meals in university…
1) butter toasted english muffins w/a slice of processed cheese and scrammbled eggs
sometimes I would skip out of the egg…depended on the budget
2) chicken, corn and cooked spinach- i’d buy a can of diced or stewed tomatoes and throw it into a wrap. So good!
I ate a lot of mac n cheese cooked with water instead of milk because the milk always went bad before I could use it. I also ate a lot of popcorn and diet soda. We weren’t allowed to have a toaster oven in our dorm room, but popcorn poppers were allowed, so I got one of the ones that had sort of a flat non-stick bottom and figured out how to make all kinds of things in the popcorn popper…fried hamburgers, grilled cheese, french toast, stirfry… ahhh, the good ole days. I also ate a lot of cereal and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (still love those to this day).
anything easy to cook in a single pot. like pasta stir-fries, fried rice, sandwiches. easy stuff!
Fantastic responses, guys! I think it’s great we share so many similar tastes all over the world!
jetgirl,
We don’t actually have “Spaghetti-os” here, but I do like tinned meals – I like a certain tinned spaghetti with meatballs and baked beans with sausages… There’s a nacho ravioli in a tin that Jac likes too.
Melissa,
Yep, I’ll be 34 on 3rd April. I still eat tinned meals (see reply to jetgirl above), though maybe not as often as I used to, now that Jac is around to cook yummy meals.
Megan,
We spread a little butter or margarine (yes, I know! Margarine! But Jac actually prefers it on bread, to butter! I’m not that fussed) on outside of the bread before toasting. I’m with you – I don’t plan to stop eating instant noodles. I reckon I could win lotto and be super rich (if only!) and I’d still crave my Maggi noodles with a soft half-boiled egg stirred through.
Ladyred,
Yes – we did eat quite a bit of pasta and jarred sauce. I must say I never liked tuna much until my 30’s! Not sure why. Never been a fan of cereal – more to do with my culture/upbringing, I think. Grew up not eating cereal much, so I don’t find it very satisfying. :)
Charlene,
Heheheh. I knew that’s what you’d say! LOL.
Holly,
We were lucky we didn’t have a roach problem – I am a real wuss when it comes to cockroaches. My flatmate did like those Continental packet pastas too – the ones Keith Floyd did ads for (remember?). I liked scrambled eggs on toast too back then (still do now!). It was an easy way to get my fix of savoury, protein and carbs. Our flat was in Highgate near Lord St, not as close to the city/Northbridge as I’d have liked. But my second flat was in Northbridge and was very handy for cafes and shops.
E,
I think no matter what I do, I will always have those “student” cravings! Jac likes to have tins of Campbells soups in the cupboard – sometimes we just zap a tin of soup and share it out of the same dish, or she’ll use the “Cream of” soup to make a casserole or sauce.
Sam,
Wow, $40K for a house! Your lamb dish sounds great – I love lamb! I’ll mention it to Jac. :) My flatmate and I used to go to the old Brisbane pub when it was a grotty place workmen used to drink their beers at (not the trendy place it is now)… we’d have enough money just to buy a drink each and we’d play pool on their cheap (sometimes free) tables. We had to put up with comments from the workmen sitting watching us – they thought they were witty, but weren’t.
deborah,
Yes- flatmate and I did nachos and the quicker/lazier chips and salsa too, from time to time. Jac makes great nachos – though we don’t have them often. I like to zap baked beans and have them on corn chips, like nachos but not really!
More replies to your comments this evening, cheers, guys!
I must be one to have the easiest experience. I moved away from home straight to my university dorm room which was arranged for one student in each room, so I never had roomie-related problem and there was a cafetaria downstairs that served meals (which were very much like your home-cooked meals) three times a day. It’s not that I went to a fancy school or something, it’s just the way things are in where I live. It’s pretty much like what Chen said in the comment above, that food is easily available and not expensive so singles and students living alone can just eat out.
sumogirl,
I must admit I enjoyed my meals, simple as they were. I’ve always enjoyed tinned meals, for example! Sweet potato with garlic and butter sounds delicious.
YuYu,
I loved eating boxed macaroni cheese too. My flatmate and I would cook it up and share it – two big bowls’ worth. So satisfying.
Rosa,
Once I got a job in a cafe, my eating improved remarkably. Like you, I ate a lot of the food there – this meant I got at least one excellent meal a day… well, on the days I worked!
laundrydays,
I like that tinned dace with black beans! I think it was my grandma who introduced me to that. She liked it with rice and some fried Chinese greens on the side. So simple but really good. I used to make my tins of SPAM last a few meals (actually, I still do that!). I prefer SPAM to Ma Ling – something extra fatty in flavour about the Ma Ling that I didn’t like as much.
Kelly,
I’ve never eaten potato crisps as sandwich fillings, but I definitely ate lots of Mi Goreng. That’s something I will keep eating! All this talk about Mi Goreng is making me crave it… maybe for breakfast tomorrow…
bonnie,
I love raw mushrooms in toasties. I like Vegemite, cheese and tomato but don’t have that combo often as there are usually yummier combos available at the time! Jac would probably go for avocado and Vegemite, as she is a big fan of both.
Caro,
I don’t know what I’d have eaten for many many meals if Mi Goreng didn’t exist! I used to be quite self conscious about eating them as flatmates thought they were smelly… when I met Jac I introduced her to “stinky noodles” (what I’d begun to call Mi Goreng)… even now Jac will say “Let’s have stinkies for dinner”! :)
emma,
Oooooh yum!!!
Kagenosuke,
Sounds like my kind of alone food! But of course you know my alone trick of ordering a truckload of Chinese. Heheheh.
Nelson,
I love Nutella but don’t eat much of it these days as I get hopelessly addicted! I love the little packs you can buy that come with the little spatula for eating it with.
the wicked noodle,
For some reason, I’ll have toasties for breaky or lunch no problem, but there’s some psychological thing which means toasties for dinner for me just isn’t a satisfying meal!
Chen,
I wish all the time we had the hawker stalls available early morning and late at night! So many times I wake up and wish I could go out somewhere and have fishball kway teow soup or char siu wantan mee for breakfast like I did when I was a kid – used to go with my mum to the market just so I could have noodles for breakfast before school.
gina,
Both sound good to me! I especially love toasted English muffin with scrambled egg.
Lisa,
I like the sound of all the things you cooked in your popcorn popper – very MacGyverish. :)
dea,
Oh yes. I am still a one pot/one dish fan. Mostly because I can’t stand having to wash lots of dishes afterwards.
bella,
I couldn’t afford to live alone for the first few years… but I loved living alone once I was able to. I’d have loved access to a cafeteria. I used to live in a flat across the road from a 24-hr service station. I’d often drop in late at night and grab myself one of those ghastly chicken Hero sandwiches. I loved those!
Very good, but, just staying on the theme of toasted treats – get a couple of flat flour tortillas, layer cheese and shredded meat (pepperoni or chorizo work well) and add some tomatoes between them – then toast.
Ideally in a panini grill.
Phwoar. :)
I’m a little late with my post, but I thought I’d share what I used to eat when I left home for university: grilled cheese sandwiches, especially with Campbell’s tomato soup. Lots of macaroni and cheese from a box mix, Hamburger Helper, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, spaghetti, etc. Very similar to what everyone else had. Good stuff, though!
Tinned spaghetti on toast, boiled pasta with tinned tuna and not much else, pasta mixed with wahtever is left in the fridge! If in doubt, go home!
First year away from home was at a Uni residential college and meals were part of the deal (St Cats, UWA). The meals were mainly OK, but some were diabolical — beef olives spring to mind… We used to go to Greasies in Hampden Rd, Nedlands to get burgers and fish and chips on Thursday (beef olive) nights. That was the early 70s and I STILL remember the night beef olives were on the menu ;-) Anyhow digressing down memory lane…
The next year my sister moved in to a flat with me and we actually ate pretty well. Cheap, but well. One of my favourites was a beef casserole/stew (chuck/flank/stewing steak? cheap, anyway) with Leggos tomato paste and lots of veges and a spiral pasta cooked in (from the Leggos cookbook!).
Oh, and I bought my first house in Guildford as a single 23-year-old female for $28K! The banks didn’t readily lend to single females back then…
I used to live on pasta, cooked by me though. I think it is a bit weird since pasta is something you can really get tired of, and now I can’t really eat it more than once a week, but back then I must have eaten pasta for months and never get tired of it (I changed the ingredients everyday, but still).
Ladyred, tune and cheese I foind great together!! There’s a cafe near my place that doeas great tuna melts sandwiches, (toasted bread, tuna and emmental cheese) and they are the loveliest! Also, crab quesadillas and fish tacos, cheese works great with everything!
TFP, I do find a bit weird the mushrooms and mayo one, that’s like too simple for me or something!!
Fudge,
That sounds good. Like quesadillas, no? We have a flat sandwich press, so I could try that one of these days.
April,
And I am even later with my reply! All the things you mention are things I quite like to eat! LOL.
kissy,
Yes! And bring laundry with you so you can use mum and dad’s washing machine!
Rhonda,
$28K for a house! Funny to think how prices have gone up over the years!
lalalu,
Hehehe, well , we all have different tastes! I love mushroom and mayo. In fact, I had a chicken, mushroom and mayo toastie this morning, and it was fabulous!
This is a cool topic, as I found while browsing thru ur archives.. I am a big fan of your site, since a year ago! When I was a Uni student in Perth, I tried to save and made regular meals of cabbage fried with garlic and oyster sauce/fish sauce + fried egg and porridge. To make porridge, I would boil Soya Beans + Ikan Bilis and then add the rice. ( I reckon it gave the porridge a nice yong tau foo taste! and sweetness, the soft beans were yummy too) My 2nd regular dish was a Tin of Home-Brand Tuna+ home-made Pasta sauce +onions + frozen Veg on Pasta Twists. good old days huh.
I like your blog very much ever since my friend whom is studying in Perth showed me your blog.
I am still a student living alone in a house full of students and working people and sad to say that I have to cook my meals and eat alone all the time, so pasta is the best option. I love having sandwiches as well! Occasionally if I have the time I will make some hearty like grilled chicken with potatoes, french bean and some gravy along-side. Indonesian instant gravy helps too..
Cheers KristiChen, I’m pleased you like the blog. I used to eat loads of toasted sandwiches but these days I go through phases – I may be in the mood for toasties for a week and eat one every day for breakfast; then I’ll go through a phase of not having any at all. Mmm, grilled chicken with potatoes, French beans and gravy sounds lovely.
mmmmm, toasties. I completely understand. We are building a home at the moment, rediscovering this little gem from my childhood has been a real money saver.
Your ham tomato and mustard toastie looks great! *opens fridge door* breakfast!!
Thanks for the idea, Ill link back to your website :)
Did you ever try making a 2min noodle toastie?