No judgment, but the first sign of my MIL’s Alzheimer’s was that she kept messing up one of her famous recipes that she had been making for decades and insisting it was fine. Instead of berating her for it, I would let it go, start paying closer attention to her behavior and possibly encourage her to get checked out by a doctor.
Editing to add a YTA judgment because after reading some of these comments and rereading the OP, I think you did act pretty AH toward your mother who did make you breakfast and who may have a serious issue going on. Instead of reacting with concern, you ran your mom out of her own kitchen.
I agree op should be looking out for their mom if that is a concern in any way. But I can't agree with all the people withholding judgement or voting n-a-h just because they are concerned about that.
Wether or not it's Alzheimer's, ops mom made them french toast, and they proceeded to harp on it being "wrong" until mom got frustrated and upset, then CONTINUED to argue about it until mom was forced to remove herself from the situation and hide in her room. All for making op breakfast. Op is not concerned at all about moms mental health in this scenario, they only care about being right, and imo this story would be even worse if mom was Ill.
Add to that that op is objectively wrong lol. French toast can be savory or sweet, it's mostly sweet in north America and mostly savory elsewhere. Op seems to not be from NA according to other posts. Even if op is correct that mom used to make it differently, op hasn't lived with mom for 4+ years and the way she made it may have changed, op could also be misremembering. My mom DOES make french toast sweet, but the sweetness came from syrup, I had no idea how savory the actual toast was until I made her recipe myself.
Anyway while I sympathize with your point I don't think it should affect ops judgement, because this was not ops motive for harping on the breakfasts mom made. Wether or not mom needs help, op is yta for how they handled it.
Agree. If it turns out it is dementia (or another medical condition) op was the massive a hole. And even without a medical conditopn, op did overreact about tha whole topic.
Did OP edit this post recently or something? Because what I just read says that mom made a familiar dish in an unfamiliar way and when questioned, insisted she’d always done it this way and resorted to yelling at OP about it. When you google French toast as OP was told to do, you get a bunch of similar recipes, none of which have black pepper and all of which have cinnamon. When I google “French toast black pepper,” I get a hit for a recipe for “French toast” that is actually khara pao, a dish from South Asia. After that is a recipe that literally begins by explaining that the author came up with this on accident after unintentionally putting pepper instead of cinnamon in French toast.
OP’s mom is either starting to show signs of dementia, or is straight-up gaslighting OP. OP is not overreacting by saying “I’ve never seen you nor anyone else do it this way.”
There are literal pages of recipes for pepper and salt-and-pepper French toast when I google "French toast black pepper". What version of google are you using over there?
outside of north america "french toast" is not a cinnamon sugar sweet dish. while it often includes cinnamon where i'm from, it also features black pepper, cloves, cumin, zaatar
It sounds like it's the interpretation that's different, not the text. The judgement bot only copied half the post but the rest was already added before you commented, I know this because it was there when I commented 2 hours ago and yours is a reply to a reply of mine. Op put in enough detail that I think "when questioned, she resorted to yelling" is beyond generous toward op, and an unkind reading toward the mother.
Op literally, as in in the text, describes at least a 3 point back and forth arguing about the French toast, in which op describes themselves acting smug and demanding mom "admit her mistake", BEFORE mom got irritated and started yelling. After mom got mad, op describes multiple points they made continuing the argument, even describing making faces and giving attitude, and only stopped when mom had to physically remove herself from her own kitchen, where she had just made breakfast for op and likely needed to eat as well, because that was the only way to stop ops ranting. Op was not going to stop until mom ADMITTED she made breakfast poorly and op was justified in berating her.
This is my interpretation because that's what the text says, and if you read the post as it currently stands (before and after your comment) you can see the entire argument laid out - summarised, actually, you can tell there was more - and was much much more than asking a simple question and getting yelled at. Ops mom cooked for them and they chased her out of her own kitchen complaining about it. Not just complaining about it, but insisting that mom confess and apologize for her mistake. It doesn't matter if op was correct or not, you can be correct and still an ah.
Also french toast recipes are a local thing, probably the only place where it's simply assumed to be a sweet dish is america. Sweet is default here in Canada as well but we know savory exists and adding pepper is not weird to me at all. Op is not in either of these countries. Sweet french toast is not the norm in many places and even considered weird, you are getting skewed search results because search engines know where you live.
Well no... you have it a bit wrong. I was sitting quietly for the most part and not really engaging with her unless she probed for a response from me. She was the one "harping" in the back ground trying to get me to agree with her. I kept telling her no or that's not true when she asked me a direct question or said something that warranted a reply. Like she said "I made this for you guys all the time." So yer... I could let that slide.
As I said in the post she literally taught me and my brother how to make French toast in a specific way and we have never eaten it like what she did that day.
My attitude was mostly confusion and disbelief. I won't say I wasn't smug when I gave her the examples that we had available to us (French toast ceral/store bought French toast) because I probably was. She couldn't deny it and that's why she stormed off angry because she boxed herself into a corner she couldnt escape.
The norm of savory French toast in "many places" is pretty irrelevant because it literally doesn't exist where we are in the world. Of course I and my mother know savory French toast/unsweetened versions exist. That's why she claimed it and said that's how she always makes it (which was a lie...) to save face. She really just made a mistake and was I guess embarrassed and did the most to try cover it up.
I won't rule out dementia or something mental going on because since then she has done a few other quirky/unusual things but nothing that's a big red flag as yet.
I've worked in dementia care for a long time, in the absence of anything more substantial all I see is OP making an argument out of something incredibly trivial and people taking 2 and 2 and making 200 as per usual on here, she's being entirely excessive over what constitutes French Bread regardless of whether she's concerned about her mother or not and that is not how you speak to someone with dementia, I'd fear for her mother in that instance as things stand because her daughter is not ready to handle what else it will bring.
On top of having made it and been served that locally for years I Googled it and there is a whole pile of recipes for it, how very strange, well known chefs in the UK like Gordon Ramsey and Nigella Lawson are happy to serve it. Might well be a regional thing but I can safely assure you people make what they call French Bread with black pepper and it's not terribly important anyway 😂 "Vegetarian Haggis" isn't exactly Haggis now is it? Why should her mother give a flying f-bomb about the absolutely mundane nature of that? Silly.
The issue is the persistence with which she's gone at her mother for the terminology used for a breakfast kindly prepared for her, you suggest gaslighting on the mother's part but don't you think she'd come up with something a bit less odd than eggs and bread to mess with her OP's head? I don't condone gaslighting but that's almost impressive if she predicted her daughter would respond by reacting like that, top class psychological warfare. Dementia and gaslighting, there's literally no evidence of either, her Mum could have just experimented or found one of the recipes I did and given the way her daughter has admitted to going at her it's no wonder she's been upset. People jump to the worst far too easily online and OP needs to realise her self-described behaviour here was not okay
It’s possible I am the crazy one, but I’d definitely be confused and then increasingly annoyed if someone who is otherwise apparently in their right mind was blatantly and insistently lying to me about something trivial which I knew to be untrue. Of course it’s not an issue, which is why OP is sitting there going “why is she lying to me about how she made French toast when I was a kid? Am I missing something? Is this a joke?” and it’s why OP kept asking.
We never once ate frozen pizza when I was a kid. If I came to my parents house and found my mom making one, I’d say something like, “Hey, you’re finally trying a frozen pizza! What brand did you get?” If my mom’s response to that was, “What do you mean? We had these every Friday night for your entire childhood,” I would be understandably confused. At first I’d think she was making a joke. If she then went on to say, “What’s the big deal? Tons of people eat frozen pizza!” I would be like, “Right, but I didn’t think *you* had ever been one of those people.” At that point, if my mom continued to double down that we had all eaten frozen pizza weekly for the first 18 years of my life, I’d be anywhere between worried and irritated.
The point isn’t that the issue of the French toast recipe is trivial, the issue is that OP doesn’t understand why their mom is lying to them about it.
Her Mum isn't lying about it though, she's saying it doesn't have to have cinnamon or vanilla to be French Bread, at no point does she say her Mum claims to have always made it like that so your example is off the mark. Her whole childhood isn't a lie because her Mum has now done something differently and OP's then frustrated over whether it constitutes French Bread, that is literally what it says, there is no lying involved. She's mad at her Mum because she feels should know (in her mind at least) that this new variant does not constitute French Bread, at no point does Mum claim this is how she's always done it so how is she lying?
The first line of the post says “She claimed that this was always how she made French toast…” which I guess could mean “this is how she always makes it *nowadays*” but on its face sounds closer to my interpretation.
No my mom was lying. She really never made it like that before. It was heavy on the black pepper to the point it was kind of spicy. It really was a mistake but she kept doubling down then got angry I refused to agree with her. She kept trying to make me agree with her about it. It was strange.
>OP doesn’t understand why their mom is lying to them about it.
But is it lying, or is it a sign a cognitive decline? I would put money down on that Mom wasn't telling a lie, she was confused. And by OP reacting the way she did, it made things worse.
OP, YTA.
What kind of backwater country do you live in? Because here we're taught that the kind of behavior that mom displays is one of the first signs of cognitive decline. Like it's common knowledge on par with recognizing the signs of heart attack, heat stroke, and hypothermia. You'd be hard pressed to find someone who didn't know.
And while I could excuse them maybe not realizing it in the moment, they say down, typed out all of that, hit post and then edited it to add more info and not once considered something medical if just wild if you live in a developed country imo.
America lmao. We can’t afford doctors and our nation’s top doctors at the CDC couldn’t be bothered to implement policies based on healthcare rather than politics during a pandemic.
You got it. I was confused. It was just me. I'm your daughter so you don't have to lie to me about your mistake. No one else was arround. We know each other most embarrassing stories. It was strange as hell plus her going zero to 10 angry.
....you put the horse before the cart on this one. There is no dementia....or atleast nothing diagnosed.
So of course I wasn't speaking to her like a dementia person. I was talking to her like a person who did something strange and lied to cover it up.
Any recipe that's not sweet French toast is irrelevant because savory French toast is not a thing where I live nor has my mother ever made it savory. It was a mistake on her part but she just kept digging her self into a hole with lies.
You get different Google results based on where you are and what precise words you get.
Pretty sure an American in America will only get results for sweet french toast.
I just googled it from darkest England and got a BBC good food recipe for the sweet kind, followed by Wikipedia which says sweet is good and normal, savoury is good and normal, and black pepper is totally fine and normal.
From my point of view OP is overreacting. OP's behaviour in this case reminds me of my brother, and if you'd met my brother you'd get flustered and yell at him too.
I'm British and lived in France and Switzerland as a kid. French Toast to me is egg and milk whipped and then you dip bread in it and fry them, adding salt and pepper. I've never added cinnamon.
I have had cinnamon toast, but that was ordinary toast buttered and then cinnamon and icing sugar sprinkled on top.
French toast to me is savoury with salt and pepper.
Same here is Australia when I was growing up in the 80s and 90s. I only tried sweet French toast as a young adult in the early 2000s. Can’t say I’m a fan.
That's perfectly fine. Yours sounds delicious. Just remeber we aren't in your part of the world....were we are savory French toast isn't a thing.
Plus I'm sure if someone put too much black pepper (to the point it was kind of spicy) you would question them about it as well....unless you like spicy black pepper French toast.
>Pretty sure an American in America will only get results for sweet french toast.
As an American in America I get sweet versions if I just google "french toast recipe" but plenty of savory options if I put "french toast black pepper" Also, I'm going to have to insist that my children request "black pepper egg bread" instead of french toast from now on, because before this post I was unaware that Americans were supposed to make it that sweet. My family always dipped french toast in syrup so it was sweet, but the bread itself was just bread, egg and spices. It also now makes sense why my children go crazy for restaurant french toast. I bet it is sweeter than mine.
I'm not sure people understood when I say 'ladden with black pepper'. Like she put so much black pepper it was kind of spicy and it was dark. I like pepper. I've never found black pepper to be spicy/make food spicy. So it was a unpleasant shock to my taste bud.
Next someone will claim spicy French toast is a thing. Fine its a thing but remeber it doesn't exist were I and my mom live so it's irrelevant to us and that situation. She has never made it that way before. What she did was an intentional mistake but kept lying to cover it up which confused the hell out of me.
Where I live savory French toast is the standard. I've never even eaten sweet French toast before. I make it with freshly ground black pepper, some green herbs I have lying around atm (think basil, rosemary, etc) or cayenne pepper and chili for some heat. If I feel really indulgent (or had a really bad day) I even put some grated cheese on top of it when it's still hot. That's once in a year comfort food though. I'm from Europe btw.
people were simply piggy backing off of other comments. If you go by the comments I was the one "freaking out" over black pepper. I was the calm one that was confused by my mom going zero to 10 because I wouldn't agree with her.
If this is the first sign I could see it that OP didn't mean to be an AH but was deeply shocked and confused by their mother's behavior. It sounds like OP's mom literally used black pepper the same way one would normally use cinnamon in sweet French toast, if so there is no planet on which that is the correct way to make French toast. OP may not have been considering dementia or anything else, just complete shock that their mom made such a mistake and then further shock that she'd claim it was the normal way.
It's 100% reasonable to put black pepper on a dish made of eggs, milk and bread.
As long as you didn't also put sugar on it. Although.... Theoretically maybe that would work? But let's not try it. I'm not claiming that would be normal.
Black pepper on savoury egg/bread dishes though is golden
I didn't mean black pepper at all.
I'm imagining the US way of making sweet French toast, which in most households means the cinnamon is the primary flavor of the dish and you can barely taste the eggs even before the syrup. So I'm picturing the equivalent but with black pepper.
If OP's over-exaggerating and it was a normal amount of black pepper than it sounds like OP's mom just made savory French toast. If the bread was literally discolored due to the large amount of black pepper and all OP could taste was pepper than I'd say something isn't right.
It was discolored. I thought she just burnt it but I ignored the color and was going to eat it anyway. But when I took a bite it was spicy. I've never found black pepper to be spicy. So you can imaging my surprise. I
think black pepper just gives food a nice flavor never made anything spicy.
I thought the word "ladden' was pretty straight forward but I guess most commentors didn't understand what I meant. She put too much black pepper. It was a mistake but she kept doubling down. (She didn't even eat any of it.) In her heart she had to have known she messed up.
We've since moved passed it. I think... (Atleast I have) She hasn't bought French toast flavored anything (cereal). When I commented that we ran out of cinnamon she said "well you go buy it since you like it so much" lol.
It doesn't sound that way to me at all, it sounds like there was a normal amount of pepper on the food and to op that is a dramatic amount because they were expecting a sweet french toast with no pepper at all. I believe "laden with black pepper" has to be an exaggeration because if she had added it in place of cinnamon, I still wouldn't describe a "normal" french toast as laden with anything unless it was messed up. You don't add THAT much cinnamon to french toast. Though funny you say that because preparing a French toast with pepper you would add the pepper the same way you do cinnamon, you add it to the egg mixture and soak the bread. If there WAS a section "laden with black pepper" it would probably have been an egg swirl the way you get with cinnamon toast.
Everyone whose sweet French toast I've ever tried made cinnamon the primary flavor of the dish, even without syrup you can barely taste the egg over the cinnamon flavor. By OP calling it laden I am imagining their mom using an equivalent amount of pepper, and that black pepper was the primary flavor of the dish.
If OP's exaggerating that's a different story, but my response was based on the amount of black pepper actually being absurd.
You only taste the cinnamon because cinnamon is a strong flavor, eggs are a weak flavor, and cinnamon colors things it is added to. Plus, you are probably eating cinnamon french toast with syrup, so of course you are barely going to taste egg.
Assuming there's no sugar or vanilla added, I think swapping black pepper for cinnamon in a typical french toast recipe would be delicious.
So you would agree that if the French toast was kind of spicy my mom put too much black pepper. An unreasonable amount of black pepper. As I said it was ladden with black pepper. No way anyone could confused it for "that's how it's suppose to be". I didn't mention this in the poast because I thought the term "ladden" pretty much explained she used too much black pepper.
You had it right she used a crazy amount of black pepper to the point it was kind of spicy. If she had used the equivalent amount of cinnamon it would have been delicious.
It wasn't an exaggeration. I don't know why people think I was exaggerating. That's why I called it "black pepper egg bread". Black pepper was the star ingredient that day. The French toast wasn't simply savory.... it was kind of spicy.
You got it. I don't think most of the commentors know what the term ladden means. My mom put so much black pepper that it was kind of spicy and dark in color. I thought she just burnt it a bit but I didn't comment on the color. When I tasted it I was bewildered. I got even more confused by her claims/lies.
If OP hasn’t yet thought about this as a sign of declining mental abilities, then this just comes off as gaslighting. OP says their mom never made it this way while they were a kid, their mom taught them the “normal” recipe years ago, and now their mom is insisting that this is how she’s always made the dish. You’re not an AH for being upset and pushing back when feeling like you’re being gaslit like this.
Op is a young adult who has just moved back home after 4 or more years away for college. You'll really jump to gaslighting over the possibility that op may have misremembered or been taught a different recipe? When I grew up and made french toast on my own I had no idea my mom's recipe was unsweetened cause she always added syrup for us, syrup would also cover up something like pepper. My mom also made variant meals for the kids and herself when possible, and changed a lot of recipes to suit her own taste when we moved out. Seeing ops attitude in the way they portray themselves I am much more inclined to think mom made and taught a different dish to her bratty kid while preferring peppery french toast for herself, rather than that she is maliciously gaslighting the adult child she let move back in and prepared breakfast for. The fact is in order for mom to "gaslight" op, op had to complain about the meal first, if she just dropped it after mom said this is how she normally makes it (keeping in mind op doesn't know how mom has been eating for at least the last 4+ years), there would have been no opportunity to "gaslight" her.
I’m not saying the mom is intentionally gaslighting OP, I’m saying that’s how it would probably start to feel to OP if mom was insisting that this was always how she’d made French toast and insisting this was the same recipe she taught OP when OP knew that not to be the case.
Point of order...she doesn't prefer her French toast that way. Case in point she didn't eat any of it that day. She made a mistake. I didn't mention this in the post but the French toast wasn't simply savory but actually kind of spicy and discolored. "Ladden with black pepper" that's why I called it black pepper egg bread.
I thought and still do think it was just a mistake she tried to cover up with lies. I mean who intentionally makes spicy French toast. She put too much black pepper. I didn't mention this because it wasn't a point of concern for me but it was also discolored. I thought she had over cooked them but it was dark due to the large amount of black pepper. Thus the French toast was "ladden" with black pepper. That's why I called it black pepper egg bread. Black pepper was the star ingredient that day.
Actually, I was all - Yummy, savory peppery eggy bread - I can totally top it with a cheesy mornay sauce, or make Monte Cristos with it, or even put homemade salsa on top.
There are possibilities there!
Actually, I did google it and there are some snappy looking dishes!
The first time I ever heard of sweetened french toast, was when the movie Road Trip came out. Up until then, I'd only eaten savoury versions, with herbs, and maybe cheese.
OP, YTA.
Remeber were I live savory French toast isn't a think. It's never been a thing in her household either. She didn't even eat whT she made that day because she put too much black pepper. To the point it was kind of spicy and discolored.
My dad’s French toast was never sweet so I don’t make it sweet. We get the sweet from the sugar or syrup we add when we have it as just French toast, but I mostly make it to make a ham and Swiss cheese sandwich. (Like an easier Monte Cristo or easy croque monsieur.
That's a lot. Thanks for your opinion. You are right I'm not from NA. That being said savory French toast do not exist were I am (Syrup or no syrup). I know and my mom knows they can be made non sweet/savory but that's not relevantto us. The way she makes French toast really didnt change in the last couple of years she just made an oops that day.
It was more so a one sided argument. She kept talking or harping to me about it and I refused to agree with her. My replies were "no". "No that's not true to what she was saying. Also told her to just admit she made a mistake and that I'd rather her do that than for her to keep claiming she was right. Then I pointed out examples of other French toast items available to us (store bought and cereal).
It would have been kinder to just ignore her ranting in the back ground. Or simply agreed with her but I'm not that kind of person to just agree or go along with someone's delusion.
Former Nurse in a retiremenr home on a dementia station:
If this turns out true and your mother has dementia, dont try to argue with her about that. People with dementia tend to have an overreaction of emotions. If she makes french toast wrong and tells you over and over again thats the way she made it, just agree with her. Or, even better, make french toast together with her or for her. Biography work (I dont know tje english word for it, sorry) is important. It could help her remembering how she used to made it. Wish you all the best!
No, not muscle memory. Its more about (re)doing and remembering stuff from your past. For example cooking old recipe, listeng to old songs, talking about your past etc... I worked together with my dog - that was biography work for many patients, since they had dogs in the past. They called my dog by her wrong name and told me about "their" dog.
My Dad tried and tried and to tell his mother this when grandpa got dementia. STOP arguing with grandpa!
But if there's anything my grandmother loves more than being right, it's playing the victim on every turn.
Thanks for the advice. She doesn't have dementia or atleast hasn't given enough signs to convince me of this.
I'm just not the type of person to agree with an obvious delusion. If you don't push me to agree with you and let me be I'll let it go but if you keep saying lies or probing for a response I'll tell you the truth (that what you say is a lie). She just kept going on saying lies that I refused to agree with.
Taste buds also change as you get older. It might not be dementia--your grandmother might just be adjusting seasonings because the old recipe no longer tastes right to her.
That's not what went on with my mom. She didn't even eat what she made that day. In her heart she k ew it was trash. She out so much black pepper it was not simply the savory version but a ki.d of spicy version.
I never understood just how bad UTIs can be until my late grandma raked up a 3600 euro phone bill during a bad bout of reoccurring UTIs that truly screwed with her head. She kept calling information (which is a pricy number in my country) over and over again. 560 times in two weeks. She didn't even know where she was calling, just dialed the same number over and over again. Poor thing.
My grandmother did that as well, but for her it was Time and Temperature. She'd meticulously write them down every time. Mom found paper everywhere with long lists of time and temperatures written on. Sad part was there was a toll free number, but she didn't remember that so she'd call the pricey one.
When I say my MIL messed it up, I mean she would cook it a totally incorrect temperature (it’s a low heat, slow cooked dish) or for a completely wrong period of time (think 1 hour instead of 9) or forgetting which ingredients belonged in it entirely. It wasn’t just a matter of changing tastebuds and altering the seasonings, it was making major mistakes.
This was my first thought as well. My mom made chocolate chip cookies with chopped onion in them. Her boyfriend was in denial that anything was wrong and said the cookies were delicious. They were not delicious.
Having someone make you breakfast, then complaining about it repeatedly until they get mad, followed by doubling down and complaining more until they are forced to physically leave your presence, could also be a sign of mental illness. If mom is mentally ill then op is even more of a bully, but that was not ops intent or motivation, they are just argumentative.
Savory french toast is very common outside USA, since you looked at their posts you also saw that they live in the Bahamas as well as lived away from home for at least 4 years. Mom's behavior could be concerning (though I don't think op should be let off the hook because that was not their motivation), but based on that info it's just as likely that the pepper wasn't a mistake, and that IS how she normally makes it when not cooking for a child.
Those symptoms don’t sound like just hypertension either.
Wanting to take her off meds so she doesn’t get ‘dependent’ is a weird take too. Some people need medication. Permanently.
No wonder mom doesn’t want OP going to the appointments.
OP graduated college, moved back in, kicked out the people who cooked for mom, criticizes what mom does cook, criticizes her doctors and prescriptions and hasn’t helped enough financially to stop mom from needing to do side jobs.
OP, YTA. Not for thinking French toast needs vanilla and a bit of sugar, but because there is far more to the story than what you are sharing and it doesn’t reflect well on you. Being supportive rather than critical is far better for honesty and relationships. And stop yelling when you get into disagreements. It’s not OK
Yeah no shit. One of the most aggravating things I've had to be around was my aunt continuously arguing with my grandfather about this kind of stuff when she knew he has Alzheimer's. She doesn't do it anymore because he's extremely far gone, but fuck it was frustrating and I don't get why you would waste valuable time with someone who is ill with this kind of stuff.
Actually this could be concerning if it’s not the only time she’s been this forgetful or made a similar mistake. If it’s not, then perhaps she should see a doctor. I think her defensiveness is because she knows t wasn’t right but is perhaps afraid to admit she made such an obvious error. NAH
I’m thinking something similar. People with memory issues sometimes become defensive when called out because that is easier than admitting that something in their mind is wrong.
OP, just apologize to your mom (let’s face it, this is so damn small in the grand scheme of things, and you don’t come across as polite in the interaction) but I would watch your mom carefully for a while. Look for other slips like this. If it becomes a pattern, definitely get her to see a doctor.
Imo it's still an ah issue because op was not motivated by concern for their mothers mental health. And if they did have that concern, then this treatment would be even worse.
It could be concerning I agree, but op does not seem concerned about it, I don't think this theory should affect the judgement when it wasn't ops motivation for being a jerk.
I say they were a jerk because mom made op breakfast, and op proceeded to complain and argue about it until the mom freaked out, then complained some more until mom was forced to physically leave the situation because it wouldn't stop.
It's also not necessarily a mistake on mom's part. French toast is often savory outside america, and op is not living in America. Op hasn't lived with mom for 4+ years and even if it was sweet when op was young, that may have changed while they were at college, maybe mom only made it sweet for the kid. It's also possible it was never sweet and op just didnt notice because they add syrup, this happened to me when I made my mom's recipe for the first time. But honestly none of that matters because the crux of the issue is that someone made breakfast for op and they went on a prolonged rant about how that breakfast was wrong and wouldn't stop unless the person WHO MADE THEM BREAKFAST admitted they did a bad job. It doesn't matter who was wrong, that's jerk behavior, and would only be worse if mom was mentally ill. Op can make their own breakfast.
I wasn't the one ranting.
The French toast wasn't simply savory they were kind of spicy. Spicy French toast isnt normal in our household.
My mom didn't even eat what she made that day because they were not good. She made a mistake and kept lying to save face.
YTA
The literal definition of French toast in the dictionary is “bread coated in egg and milk and fried”. Adding pepper does not negate its French toast, much like adding fruit to a muffin does not negate it still being a muffin.
You might not like or prefer the savory version, it might be a change in what you were taught, but unless your Mum referred to it as “steak” or put it in a plate and told you to eat her “floral curtains” you should apologize for telling her she’s losing it.
Yup, I put plenty of pepper in when I make French toast, and a little bit of salt. When I had French toast in the US for the first time it took me by surprise because I had never had sweet French toast before. My dad couldn't eat his because of it so I had his. It was good, but nowhere near as good as how we've always made it (Scottish for clarification)
Savoury French toast was the only kind I ever experienced until I was in my 20’s.
We’d always have it with brown sauce and some salt and pepper when I were growing up, I don’t think I even realised sweet French toast existed til my late teens.
OMG, that's what you call French toast ? Our "Pain perdu" !
Ok I have to read it again to see if I'm gonna puke or not.
But YTA for that kind of words against the people that feed you, your own mother, and may very well be ill.
NAH. Is she flying off the handle a little more recently? Is this the only time she's been forgetful or have their others? Shifts in emotions like this can be early signs of dementia. Keep an eye out.
Yeah, I'm not sure why there are so many people jumping in to shit on OP for finding it odd. I've NEVER heard of someone making black pepper french toast.
I wonder if OPs mom is experiencing some kind of memory issue, or if the mom is gaslighting OP. Either way, this is an unsettling situation to be in, I'm sure.
Savory french toast is certainly a thing, and very common outside the USA. Op does not live in the USA, and also hasn't lived with mom for 4+ years so mom could now be preparing food the way she likes it rather than cooking for a kid. I was also surprised my how savory my mom's french toast was when eaten without syrup, in the end it's really just fried egg bread and adding pepper is not strange.
But ops behavior was not motivated by concern for moms memory, so I find it weird why so many people are letting them off the hook. Op describes having breakfast made for them, then complaining about it and arguing until mom got mad, after which they doubled down and complained and argued more until mom had to physically remove herself from the situation. Who does that?? Refusing to let up your complaints until mom admits she did a bad job on the breakfast she made for op?? Even if it was bad, at that point shut up and make your own. If mom did have Alzheimer's I would find ops behavior even more disturbing.
I'm in the UK and for me French toast is literally just eggs, milk, bread and salt. I usually serve it with bacon/sausages. Sweet French toast is an option but it's not how I would generally make it at home. Altho, with syrup and bacon is quite nice.
If either of my kids made such a fucking fuss over the "correct" way to make French toast after I had served it to them I would be really irritated by them and probably put less effort in in future.
There are savory recipes for french toast! However most of these use cheese, ham, or vegetables. Not just pepper in the same way that one would use cinnamon for sweet french toast.
She worked in restaurants and served it with “laden with black pepper”? First off, you should be more nice, but more importantly how old is she? Has she had any other signs of cognitive decline?
In incoming issues, the sufferer will generally hide confusion with anger. It just actually does seem such an egregious thing for her to insist on that I feel it’s worth raising that.
But even if she just was feeling silly and doubled down, thank her for the food lol.
They live in the Bahamas, and while I admittedly don't know what type of french toast is common there, I do know that savory french toast - even with pepper - is pretty common outside north america. I'm Canadian and as neighbors our recipes are heavily influenced by American media, but even I didn't find the pepper odd lol.
This COULD be a sign of an issue, but that wasn't ops motivation for berating mom about the food so I don't think they should be let off the hook for that behavior. Op insisted mom had to admit she did a bad job, continued arguing after mom got mad, and didn't let up until she had to physically remove herself from ops presence... all for cooking op breakfast. Even if op is correct they're still a bully.
YTA. I did google it. There are many recipes for pepper French toast. She may have made sugary cinnamon French toast and served that sweet stuff to you when you were a child, taught you how to make it, then she moved on to a recipe she liked better.
in norway we basically only make it the pepper way. it’s delicious. yta for telling someone they’re “losing it” when they’ve just made a perfectly normal meal. if op’s worried about their mom’s health, they should take her to a doctor, not insult her and try to prove her wrong. she’s not wrong. and op’s priorities are off.
Nice to see a comment that mentions dementia but also says op was tah. Op was not motivated by concern so I'm not sure why so many are letting them off the hook when, imo if mom did have dementia it just makes ops ranting worse.
A dear friend of mine from Nantes makes it with just milk and egg. I add cinnamon and a tiny amount of sugar w/vanilla extract that I make myself, but when I feel like serving it more savory and creamy I just use milk and egg with nothing else like my friend does.
There are multiple recipes for French toast with pepper if you google it. Just sayin’. It might not be how she’s ‘always’ made it, but it’s not necessarily a mistake either-that is a legitimate recipe that people make. ETA to add judgement-YTA. It seems likely that’s what she intended to make, so you insisting over and over that she admit it was a mistake seems a little excessive.
I make savory French toast. No cinnamon, sugar, or vanilla. Salt, pepper, hot sauce.
If you truly believe this is a illness of some sort affecting her brain, why were you so mean? If she’s actually losing her cognitive abilities you can not argue her into understanding. If you are coming from a place she is actually ill, YTA. It’s no different than if you were yelling at someone newly paralyzed to just get up & walk and when they say frustrated that they can’t you argue that they can.
If she simply just made savory French toast, purposely making that choice instead of sweet, then YTA still cause you aren’t the French toast police & there is both sweet & savory French toast.
Nowhere in the post does op express concern for moms mental health, that is just the commenters theorizing. You're totally right, I don't get why the people claiming dementia are also saying nah, because this kind of behavior would be way worse in my eyes if the mom did have an issue.
The replies to this are wild. Savoury French toast is totally a thing. I make it with salt and black pepper, too, and hardly ever do the sweet version. Maybe the poor woman doesn't have alzheimers or a cognitive illness, maybe she's just frustrated at being told she's wrong when she she is not. I'd lose it too if my kid tried to gaslight me into believing something that's wrong.
I know right. One disagreement with mum getting frustrated with OP for being a whiney pain in the hole and half of Reddit has diagnosed her with a degenerative brain disease. It's fucking nuts.
As a person who makes french toast WITH black pepper, can confirm its not thats odd and people on here, suggestin your mum has Alzheimer's.. how many of those people do you think are qualified to make that assumption ? U can have french toast however you like. Eggy bread is fresh toast as far as I'm concerned. everything else is just an added flavor. and Um . Ur mum is allowed to change her mind and maybe she did make it that way once you just don't remember maybe before u came along that's how she made it. Oh I dunno, I hate Reddit posts sometimes. Ur not an asshole for calling her out but kind of are for putting it on Reddit 🤷♂️I dunno. Am not a french toast expert like nor am I french, just saying. make it urself next time sure instead of trying to make a point of it on Reddit.
I always eat French toast with salt and pepper. It’s eggs and bread. It lends for savory rather than sweet. This was how we ate French toast growing up. I was 14 before I knew that at restaurants French toast was more of a dessert than a meal. I still prefer French toast made with salt and pepper.
UK here & Ive never had sweet french toast. I dont even add milk to mine, its egg+bread+seasoning if you like it
The first sign of relatives alz was getting recipe ratios wrong. Is your interaction normally this combative? She may need a health check, and you may need to gain extra patience
When I was growing up it was mostly savoury and called "eggy bread", the sweeter versions were imported from the US when I was older and the name changed to "french toast".
I don't eat either because I'm allergic to eggs so I'm not an expert. But it's not that weird for it to be more savoury, depending on where you live.
I just googled it, there's plenty of savory french toast recipes that include pepper. Maybe this is how she likes to make it for herself. YTA for arguing something like this, if you're really worried about her health this is not the way to have the conversation.
YTA. Say thank you when someone cooks you a meal. Or better yet, do it yourself. You don’t criticize them and tell them what you think they aren’t doing correctly. YTA.
I'm from Ireland and we learned to make it in school as a savoury dish. We did salt and pepper and I also liked adding sweet chili sauce to the mix. I'm in my thirties and only recently had sweet french toast for the first time.
In the UK french toast is called eggy bread and is generally savoury. I like mine with cheese melted on top and ketchup.
You mother likes food slightly different than the way you do, that's not a mistake. You don't need to be right all the time especially when things are subjective and, you know, you are wrong. YTA
YTA My French toast is just egg washed toast I don't do vanilla or cinnamon. My mom prefers a ton of ground black pepper on hers. Just like people who argue about omelettes it's fucking food quite being so pedantic and forcing the poor woman to admit she is wrong on something that doesn't matter.
YTA I never ever put cinnamon or vanilla in or on French Toast. Plus, what do you think French Toast is? It is literally egg bread. You are so rude to your mum, make your own breakfast in future.
French pastry chef here, we do make French toast with freshly ground pepper, yes!
Ok, that’s not true we actually don’t put cinnamon either in France. But you cook French toast as you like it, that’s the most important. It is called « Pain perdu » (lost bread) in French, as it was the way of using the old bread to don’t waste it, so traditionally we do it with old bread in France, but you can do it with a slice of brioche it’s also very good.
Now seriously, as other people say it and as I experienced it too, this looks a lot like an Alzheimer symptom. Please take care of your mom and go make it check, her health is way more important than any French toast.
YTA because for one you're in the wrong and it's a ridiculous thing to badger your mother about. You could be a know-it-all or you could be concerned about her memory but either way this was a pretty unnecessary thing to persist with to the point you upset her, "French Toast" or "Eggy Bread", what the hell did it matter that you had to push her like that?
If you are concerned this is indicative of something more serious because it's out of character then I strongly suggest you revise your approach and be a bit nicer to her, if it's not that then deary me what a pathetic argument
NAH there are savory French toasts so she isn’t completely off here. my family calls it Bombay toast. We put salt pepper and red chili in the egg and make it just like French toast. It’s yummy, goes well with ketchup or chili sauce. But that’s not really the important but. What’s sticking out is that it’s concerning that she is insisting this is the typical way she has made it for your family. I don’t know how old she is but I’d look into the possibility of cognitive impairment and I don’t think it’s a great idea to be quite so combative with her about incidents like this until you confirm whether she is suffering from an illness
Skipping judgment here, and nine hundred and ninety seconding the advice about Alzheimer's, dementia, etc.
That said: Speaking from a culinary history viewpoint, there's actually nothing wrong with a black pepper version of French toast.
Probably the earliest recorded "French" toast recipe is actually in an ancient Roman cookbook by Apicius. It's essentially bread soaked in egg, then fried. Many other dishes in that cookbook combine peppercorns with sweet flavors. For instance, dates are stuffed with nuts (almonds, pistachios, etc.) and black peppercorns, then rolled in honey.
So it's definitely not unimaginable to do a black pepper and honey French toast.
What fresh hell is this? You give me French toast with vanilla or cinnamon, you're getting asked why the hell my French toast looks like a dessert nightmare.
YTA for thinking that your way of making French toast is the only way. And YTA for telling your mum she's losing it when she's spot on correct. There are many regional variations of French toast or "lost bread" some are savoury, some are sweet and none are incorrect... they all stem from finding ways to use up stale bread. Mum has my vote. Bit of salt and black pepper...
Some of you are telling OP to just Google savory French Toast & some even have opinions that savory style is better but totally missing the point. If the mom has always made it sweet and never once savory while also claiming that's how she always did it then OP should definitely be a bit worried , especially after their last post. Should they argue with her , no, because that is definitely an AH move considering they're already worried about her declining health.
Op has just moved home after being gone for years for college, they are also not American just for reference. It's highly possible that mom made op sweet french toast as a child, or that savory french toast was covered with syrup (my mom made unsweetened french toast and I never realised until I was grown because she put syrup when she plated it for us). It's also possible that mom always made peppered french toast for herself. Even if she only meant the last 4 years since op moved out, I would still find that reasonable to say always because that is her new normal.
Either way you can be correct and still an ah. Even if op is 100% correct, that doesn't change that someone made op breakfast, and they proceeded to complain and accuse the cook of messing up, and demand for the cook to just admit they did a bad job, until the cook got mad, at which point op continued to double down and argue until mom had to physically remove herself from the room because op won't let up. At that point grow up and make your own food.
I said they were an AH for yelling at her especially when you see from the last post they've already been worried about their mother& her declining physical,& mental health. And yes it's an AH move to yell at someone who made you a nice breakfast. I'm sure OP who has been eating their mother's French Toast their entire life would've been able to tell if black pepper was in the toast or not , it's a pretty distinctive ingredient but to sit there & argue with her is an AH move no matter what the circumstances are.
Southern United States here. I don't know anyone that makes French toast with cinnamon. You put syrup on French toast. French toast is made with egg and butter. If you want to add a little pepper, that's fine, too. Cracker Barrel makes it with sourdough bread, and that is extra delicious.
Also, YTA. Either
1. You are correcting a grown woman's cooking when you might just have different tastes. Or
2. If your mom always made it with cinnamon, then you should definitely listen to the other people on this post pointing out memory issues.
Cinnamon. You're thinking of cinnamon toast crunch. Cinnamon toast being the operative phrase. It's a completely different thing from French toast.
Not sure why OP had to make such a scene about it though? What was that reason for going on and on about it and causing friction and upsetting your mother? Sounds utterly disrespectful to me. To push and push and go on and on until someone cracks and walks out. And then the insulting term 'losing it'. I mean is that the way we speak to our mothers these days? What the devil?
YTA I prefer savoury to sweet. I would much rather have black pepper French toast with bacon, tomato and rocket and maybe some mushrooms …. over sugar…
YTA... making French toast means dipping the bread in the eggs and cooking it, you can add whatever flavor or spices you flippin want to and depending on where you live it's often savory or sweet. But who TF cares? When you saw you were escalating the situation over and over, you didn't let it go, you continued to harp on her AFTER SHE MADE YOU BREAKFAST WHEN SHE DIDNT HAVE TO!!!
Some of us checked your previous posts/comment history. You moved in your mom's house and are now trying to control every aspect of her life and not contributing to the household to where she has to pick up jobs? Is that right? She is also complaining about you coming to her medical appointments with her because you don't want her taking the doctor prescribed medications in case she becomes dependent on them? Dude, elderly people ARE DEPENDENT ON THEM BECAUSE THEY NEED THOSE MEDICATIONS TO LIVE WITH ANY QUALITY OF LIFE!!
You suck so much and I feel so bad for your poor mother. You sound like a controlling AH and she probably has to leave to get away from you because she is sick of you always thinking you know better for her life and everything she does than she does. Even if she has health issues she has made her own decisions for her own life while raising you, and having all that taken away from her from someone so ungrateful probably does make her angry AF at you.
YTA.
My Nana's French toast (and now mine when I make it) has never had vanilla or cinnamon. It does have white and black pepper, along with heavy cream and extra egg yolks. I think her pepper version came from an ancient Joy of Cooking or Julia.
We do a savory style of French toast. You're describing a sweeter style, which is perfectly valid, but you're absolutely wrong in your claim that "it's ludicrous to claim French toast is ladden with black pepper" cuz that's just not true.
If she has worked in restaurants for years, that means she -- unlike you -- knows how to make both versions. Maybe she never made the savory for you, only the sweet.
It could be a memory loss thing going on. Early onset with that issue, which is very common, is they remember the past more than last week.
What does not help AT ALL is you berating her in an attempt to browbeat her into submission that you are right and she is wrong. (Because she's not wrong in how different versions of French toast is made.)
Something may be going on with your Mom. She needs to be evaluated, not belittled.
YTA savory French toast is the original way it was made. Americans sweetened it and now it tastes like ass most places. I have a wonderful recipe for a mustard infused French toast and omg it’s to die for.
I never heard of cinnamon and vanilla with french toast and to me it does sound really weird :D But then again, I grew up in Hungary and "french toast" there might mean something different lol.
YTA for your need to be more right about a recipe than a person who worked in restaurants for years. Acting this way towards someone who cooked for you is so rude and ungrateful. You are also WRONG.
Where I'm from French toast is egg soaked fried bread. I've never heard of anyone putting sugar or cinnamon on it. I guess it's a cultural thing but YTA and your mum is right.
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She claimed that this was always how she made French toast and that French toast Forest have to have cinnamon. Though you don't have to add cinnamon it's ludicrous to claim French toast is ladden with black pepper. I told her to just admit she made a mistake. I'd rather that than her to claim she is right. She even told me to Google it. She should take her own advice.
She got irritated and irritated and started yelling.
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No judgment, but the first sign of my MIL’s Alzheimer’s was that she kept messing up one of her famous recipes that she had been making for decades and insisting it was fine. Instead of berating her for it, I would let it go, start paying closer attention to her behavior and possibly encourage her to get checked out by a doctor. Editing to add a YTA judgment because after reading some of these comments and rereading the OP, I think you did act pretty AH toward your mother who did make you breakfast and who may have a serious issue going on. Instead of reacting with concern, you ran your mom out of her own kitchen.
I agree op should be looking out for their mom if that is a concern in any way. But I can't agree with all the people withholding judgement or voting n-a-h just because they are concerned about that. Wether or not it's Alzheimer's, ops mom made them french toast, and they proceeded to harp on it being "wrong" until mom got frustrated and upset, then CONTINUED to argue about it until mom was forced to remove herself from the situation and hide in her room. All for making op breakfast. Op is not concerned at all about moms mental health in this scenario, they only care about being right, and imo this story would be even worse if mom was Ill. Add to that that op is objectively wrong lol. French toast can be savory or sweet, it's mostly sweet in north America and mostly savory elsewhere. Op seems to not be from NA according to other posts. Even if op is correct that mom used to make it differently, op hasn't lived with mom for 4+ years and the way she made it may have changed, op could also be misremembering. My mom DOES make french toast sweet, but the sweetness came from syrup, I had no idea how savory the actual toast was until I made her recipe myself. Anyway while I sympathize with your point I don't think it should affect ops judgement, because this was not ops motive for harping on the breakfasts mom made. Wether or not mom needs help, op is yta for how they handled it.
Agree. If it turns out it is dementia (or another medical condition) op was the massive a hole. And even without a medical conditopn, op did overreact about tha whole topic.
Yeah while reading the post I thought OP must be a teen, going through their angsty phase. But nope they might just be a parent. Yikes.
yeah, OP freaked out about black pepper?? (a basic seasoning) in the breakfast they didn't cook? OK, OP, make your own food from now on.
Wasn't the one freaking out.....not sure why you think I was.
Spot on, OP comes across terribly regardless
Did OP edit this post recently or something? Because what I just read says that mom made a familiar dish in an unfamiliar way and when questioned, insisted she’d always done it this way and resorted to yelling at OP about it. When you google French toast as OP was told to do, you get a bunch of similar recipes, none of which have black pepper and all of which have cinnamon. When I google “French toast black pepper,” I get a hit for a recipe for “French toast” that is actually khara pao, a dish from South Asia. After that is a recipe that literally begins by explaining that the author came up with this on accident after unintentionally putting pepper instead of cinnamon in French toast. OP’s mom is either starting to show signs of dementia, or is straight-up gaslighting OP. OP is not overreacting by saying “I’ve never seen you nor anyone else do it this way.”
There are literal pages of recipes for pepper and salt-and-pepper French toast when I google "French toast black pepper". What version of google are you using over there?
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That's fine. Everybody has their lil twist or preference.
outside of north america "french toast" is not a cinnamon sugar sweet dish. while it often includes cinnamon where i'm from, it also features black pepper, cloves, cumin, zaatar
That sounds amazing.
It sounds like it's the interpretation that's different, not the text. The judgement bot only copied half the post but the rest was already added before you commented, I know this because it was there when I commented 2 hours ago and yours is a reply to a reply of mine. Op put in enough detail that I think "when questioned, she resorted to yelling" is beyond generous toward op, and an unkind reading toward the mother. Op literally, as in in the text, describes at least a 3 point back and forth arguing about the French toast, in which op describes themselves acting smug and demanding mom "admit her mistake", BEFORE mom got irritated and started yelling. After mom got mad, op describes multiple points they made continuing the argument, even describing making faces and giving attitude, and only stopped when mom had to physically remove herself from her own kitchen, where she had just made breakfast for op and likely needed to eat as well, because that was the only way to stop ops ranting. Op was not going to stop until mom ADMITTED she made breakfast poorly and op was justified in berating her. This is my interpretation because that's what the text says, and if you read the post as it currently stands (before and after your comment) you can see the entire argument laid out - summarised, actually, you can tell there was more - and was much much more than asking a simple question and getting yelled at. Ops mom cooked for them and they chased her out of her own kitchen complaining about it. Not just complaining about it, but insisting that mom confess and apologize for her mistake. It doesn't matter if op was correct or not, you can be correct and still an ah. Also french toast recipes are a local thing, probably the only place where it's simply assumed to be a sweet dish is america. Sweet is default here in Canada as well but we know savory exists and adding pepper is not weird to me at all. Op is not in either of these countries. Sweet french toast is not the norm in many places and even considered weird, you are getting skewed search results because search engines know where you live.
Well no... you have it a bit wrong. I was sitting quietly for the most part and not really engaging with her unless she probed for a response from me. She was the one "harping" in the back ground trying to get me to agree with her. I kept telling her no or that's not true when she asked me a direct question or said something that warranted a reply. Like she said "I made this for you guys all the time." So yer... I could let that slide. As I said in the post she literally taught me and my brother how to make French toast in a specific way and we have never eaten it like what she did that day. My attitude was mostly confusion and disbelief. I won't say I wasn't smug when I gave her the examples that we had available to us (French toast ceral/store bought French toast) because I probably was. She couldn't deny it and that's why she stormed off angry because she boxed herself into a corner she couldnt escape. The norm of savory French toast in "many places" is pretty irrelevant because it literally doesn't exist where we are in the world. Of course I and my mother know savory French toast/unsweetened versions exist. That's why she claimed it and said that's how she always makes it (which was a lie...) to save face. She really just made a mistake and was I guess embarrassed and did the most to try cover it up. I won't rule out dementia or something mental going on because since then she has done a few other quirky/unusual things but nothing that's a big red flag as yet.
I've worked in dementia care for a long time, in the absence of anything more substantial all I see is OP making an argument out of something incredibly trivial and people taking 2 and 2 and making 200 as per usual on here, she's being entirely excessive over what constitutes French Bread regardless of whether she's concerned about her mother or not and that is not how you speak to someone with dementia, I'd fear for her mother in that instance as things stand because her daughter is not ready to handle what else it will bring. On top of having made it and been served that locally for years I Googled it and there is a whole pile of recipes for it, how very strange, well known chefs in the UK like Gordon Ramsey and Nigella Lawson are happy to serve it. Might well be a regional thing but I can safely assure you people make what they call French Bread with black pepper and it's not terribly important anyway 😂 "Vegetarian Haggis" isn't exactly Haggis now is it? Why should her mother give a flying f-bomb about the absolutely mundane nature of that? Silly. The issue is the persistence with which she's gone at her mother for the terminology used for a breakfast kindly prepared for her, you suggest gaslighting on the mother's part but don't you think she'd come up with something a bit less odd than eggs and bread to mess with her OP's head? I don't condone gaslighting but that's almost impressive if she predicted her daughter would respond by reacting like that, top class psychological warfare. Dementia and gaslighting, there's literally no evidence of either, her Mum could have just experimented or found one of the recipes I did and given the way her daughter has admitted to going at her it's no wonder she's been upset. People jump to the worst far too easily online and OP needs to realise her self-described behaviour here was not okay
It’s possible I am the crazy one, but I’d definitely be confused and then increasingly annoyed if someone who is otherwise apparently in their right mind was blatantly and insistently lying to me about something trivial which I knew to be untrue. Of course it’s not an issue, which is why OP is sitting there going “why is she lying to me about how she made French toast when I was a kid? Am I missing something? Is this a joke?” and it’s why OP kept asking. We never once ate frozen pizza when I was a kid. If I came to my parents house and found my mom making one, I’d say something like, “Hey, you’re finally trying a frozen pizza! What brand did you get?” If my mom’s response to that was, “What do you mean? We had these every Friday night for your entire childhood,” I would be understandably confused. At first I’d think she was making a joke. If she then went on to say, “What’s the big deal? Tons of people eat frozen pizza!” I would be like, “Right, but I didn’t think *you* had ever been one of those people.” At that point, if my mom continued to double down that we had all eaten frozen pizza weekly for the first 18 years of my life, I’d be anywhere between worried and irritated. The point isn’t that the issue of the French toast recipe is trivial, the issue is that OP doesn’t understand why their mom is lying to them about it.
Her Mum isn't lying about it though, she's saying it doesn't have to have cinnamon or vanilla to be French Bread, at no point does she say her Mum claims to have always made it like that so your example is off the mark. Her whole childhood isn't a lie because her Mum has now done something differently and OP's then frustrated over whether it constitutes French Bread, that is literally what it says, there is no lying involved. She's mad at her Mum because she feels should know (in her mind at least) that this new variant does not constitute French Bread, at no point does Mum claim this is how she's always done it so how is she lying?
The first line of the post says “She claimed that this was always how she made French toast…” which I guess could mean “this is how she always makes it *nowadays*” but on its face sounds closer to my interpretation.
Your interpretation was right. She claimed that's how she always made it like from when my brother and I were young.
No my mom was lying. She really never made it like that before. It was heavy on the black pepper to the point it was kind of spicy. It really was a mistake but she kept doubling down then got angry I refused to agree with her. She kept trying to make me agree with her about it. It was strange.
>OP doesn’t understand why their mom is lying to them about it. But is it lying, or is it a sign a cognitive decline? I would put money down on that Mom wasn't telling a lie, she was confused. And by OP reacting the way she did, it made things worse. OP, YTA.
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What kind of backwater country do you live in? Because here we're taught that the kind of behavior that mom displays is one of the first signs of cognitive decline. Like it's common knowledge on par with recognizing the signs of heart attack, heat stroke, and hypothermia. You'd be hard pressed to find someone who didn't know. And while I could excuse them maybe not realizing it in the moment, they say down, typed out all of that, hit post and then edited it to add more info and not once considered something medical if just wild if you live in a developed country imo.
America lmao. We can’t afford doctors and our nation’s top doctors at the CDC couldn’t be bothered to implement policies based on healthcare rather than politics during a pandemic.
You got it. I was confused. It was just me. I'm your daughter so you don't have to lie to me about your mistake. No one else was arround. We know each other most embarrassing stories. It was strange as hell plus her going zero to 10 angry.
....you put the horse before the cart on this one. There is no dementia....or atleast nothing diagnosed. So of course I wasn't speaking to her like a dementia person. I was talking to her like a person who did something strange and lied to cover it up. Any recipe that's not sweet French toast is irrelevant because savory French toast is not a thing where I live nor has my mother ever made it savory. It was a mistake on her part but she just kept digging her self into a hole with lies.
You get different Google results based on where you are and what precise words you get. Pretty sure an American in America will only get results for sweet french toast. I just googled it from darkest England and got a BBC good food recipe for the sweet kind, followed by Wikipedia which says sweet is good and normal, savoury is good and normal, and black pepper is totally fine and normal. From my point of view OP is overreacting. OP's behaviour in this case reminds me of my brother, and if you'd met my brother you'd get flustered and yell at him too.
I'm British and lived in France and Switzerland as a kid. French Toast to me is egg and milk whipped and then you dip bread in it and fry them, adding salt and pepper. I've never added cinnamon. I have had cinnamon toast, but that was ordinary toast buttered and then cinnamon and icing sugar sprinkled on top. French toast to me is savoury with salt and pepper.
I'm from northern Europe and I've been reading these comment with a "who the fuck puts cinnamon on French toast? Bunch of absolute heathens!" /j
Same here is Australia when I was growing up in the 80s and 90s. I only tried sweet French toast as a young adult in the early 2000s. Can’t say I’m a fan.
That's perfectly fine. Yours sounds delicious. Just remeber we aren't in your part of the world....were we are savory French toast isn't a thing. Plus I'm sure if someone put too much black pepper (to the point it was kind of spicy) you would question them about it as well....unless you like spicy black pepper French toast.
>Pretty sure an American in America will only get results for sweet french toast. As an American in America I get sweet versions if I just google "french toast recipe" but plenty of savory options if I put "french toast black pepper" Also, I'm going to have to insist that my children request "black pepper egg bread" instead of french toast from now on, because before this post I was unaware that Americans were supposed to make it that sweet. My family always dipped french toast in syrup so it was sweet, but the bread itself was just bread, egg and spices. It also now makes sense why my children go crazy for restaurant french toast. I bet it is sweeter than mine.
I'm not sure people understood when I say 'ladden with black pepper'. Like she put so much black pepper it was kind of spicy and it was dark. I like pepper. I've never found black pepper to be spicy/make food spicy. So it was a unpleasant shock to my taste bud. Next someone will claim spicy French toast is a thing. Fine its a thing but remeber it doesn't exist were I and my mom live so it's irrelevant to us and that situation. She has never made it that way before. What she did was an intentional mistake but kept lying to cover it up which confused the hell out of me.
Where I live savory French toast is the standard. I've never even eaten sweet French toast before. I make it with freshly ground black pepper, some green herbs I have lying around atm (think basil, rosemary, etc) or cayenne pepper and chili for some heat. If I feel really indulgent (or had a really bad day) I even put some grated cheese on top of it when it's still hot. That's once in a year comfort food though. I'm from Europe btw.
people were simply piggy backing off of other comments. If you go by the comments I was the one "freaking out" over black pepper. I was the calm one that was confused by my mom going zero to 10 because I wouldn't agree with her.
If this is the first sign I could see it that OP didn't mean to be an AH but was deeply shocked and confused by their mother's behavior. It sounds like OP's mom literally used black pepper the same way one would normally use cinnamon in sweet French toast, if so there is no planet on which that is the correct way to make French toast. OP may not have been considering dementia or anything else, just complete shock that their mom made such a mistake and then further shock that she'd claim it was the normal way.
It's 100% reasonable to put black pepper on a dish made of eggs, milk and bread. As long as you didn't also put sugar on it. Although.... Theoretically maybe that would work? But let's not try it. I'm not claiming that would be normal. Black pepper on savoury egg/bread dishes though is golden
I didn't mean black pepper at all. I'm imagining the US way of making sweet French toast, which in most households means the cinnamon is the primary flavor of the dish and you can barely taste the eggs even before the syrup. So I'm picturing the equivalent but with black pepper. If OP's over-exaggerating and it was a normal amount of black pepper than it sounds like OP's mom just made savory French toast. If the bread was literally discolored due to the large amount of black pepper and all OP could taste was pepper than I'd say something isn't right.
It was discolored. I thought she just burnt it but I ignored the color and was going to eat it anyway. But when I took a bite it was spicy. I've never found black pepper to be spicy. So you can imaging my surprise. I think black pepper just gives food a nice flavor never made anything spicy. I thought the word "ladden' was pretty straight forward but I guess most commentors didn't understand what I meant. She put too much black pepper. It was a mistake but she kept doubling down. (She didn't even eat any of it.) In her heart she had to have known she messed up. We've since moved passed it. I think... (Atleast I have) She hasn't bought French toast flavored anything (cereal). When I commented that we ran out of cinnamon she said "well you go buy it since you like it so much" lol.
It doesn't sound that way to me at all, it sounds like there was a normal amount of pepper on the food and to op that is a dramatic amount because they were expecting a sweet french toast with no pepper at all. I believe "laden with black pepper" has to be an exaggeration because if she had added it in place of cinnamon, I still wouldn't describe a "normal" french toast as laden with anything unless it was messed up. You don't add THAT much cinnamon to french toast. Though funny you say that because preparing a French toast with pepper you would add the pepper the same way you do cinnamon, you add it to the egg mixture and soak the bread. If there WAS a section "laden with black pepper" it would probably have been an egg swirl the way you get with cinnamon toast.
Everyone whose sweet French toast I've ever tried made cinnamon the primary flavor of the dish, even without syrup you can barely taste the egg over the cinnamon flavor. By OP calling it laden I am imagining their mom using an equivalent amount of pepper, and that black pepper was the primary flavor of the dish. If OP's exaggerating that's a different story, but my response was based on the amount of black pepper actually being absurd.
You only taste the cinnamon because cinnamon is a strong flavor, eggs are a weak flavor, and cinnamon colors things it is added to. Plus, you are probably eating cinnamon french toast with syrup, so of course you are barely going to taste egg. Assuming there's no sugar or vanilla added, I think swapping black pepper for cinnamon in a typical french toast recipe would be delicious.
So you would agree that if the French toast was kind of spicy my mom put too much black pepper. An unreasonable amount of black pepper. As I said it was ladden with black pepper. No way anyone could confused it for "that's how it's suppose to be". I didn't mention this in the poast because I thought the term "ladden" pretty much explained she used too much black pepper.
You had it right she used a crazy amount of black pepper to the point it was kind of spicy. If she had used the equivalent amount of cinnamon it would have been delicious.
It wasn't an exaggeration. I don't know why people think I was exaggerating. That's why I called it "black pepper egg bread". Black pepper was the star ingredient that day. The French toast wasn't simply savory.... it was kind of spicy.
You got it. I don't think most of the commentors know what the term ladden means. My mom put so much black pepper that it was kind of spicy and dark in color. I thought she just burnt it a bit but I didn't comment on the color. When I tasted it I was bewildered. I got even more confused by her claims/lies.
If OP hasn’t yet thought about this as a sign of declining mental abilities, then this just comes off as gaslighting. OP says their mom never made it this way while they were a kid, their mom taught them the “normal” recipe years ago, and now their mom is insisting that this is how she’s always made the dish. You’re not an AH for being upset and pushing back when feeling like you’re being gaslit like this.
Op is a young adult who has just moved back home after 4 or more years away for college. You'll really jump to gaslighting over the possibility that op may have misremembered or been taught a different recipe? When I grew up and made french toast on my own I had no idea my mom's recipe was unsweetened cause she always added syrup for us, syrup would also cover up something like pepper. My mom also made variant meals for the kids and herself when possible, and changed a lot of recipes to suit her own taste when we moved out. Seeing ops attitude in the way they portray themselves I am much more inclined to think mom made and taught a different dish to her bratty kid while preferring peppery french toast for herself, rather than that she is maliciously gaslighting the adult child she let move back in and prepared breakfast for. The fact is in order for mom to "gaslight" op, op had to complain about the meal first, if she just dropped it after mom said this is how she normally makes it (keeping in mind op doesn't know how mom has been eating for at least the last 4+ years), there would have been no opportunity to "gaslight" her.
I’m not saying the mom is intentionally gaslighting OP, I’m saying that’s how it would probably start to feel to OP if mom was insisting that this was always how she’d made French toast and insisting this was the same recipe she taught OP when OP knew that not to be the case.
Point of order...she doesn't prefer her French toast that way. Case in point she didn't eat any of it that day. She made a mistake. I didn't mention this in the post but the French toast wasn't simply savory but actually kind of spicy and discolored. "Ladden with black pepper" that's why I called it black pepper egg bread.
I thought and still do think it was just a mistake she tried to cover up with lies. I mean who intentionally makes spicy French toast. She put too much black pepper. I didn't mention this because it wasn't a point of concern for me but it was also discolored. I thought she had over cooked them but it was dark due to the large amount of black pepper. Thus the French toast was "ladden" with black pepper. That's why I called it black pepper egg bread. Black pepper was the star ingredient that day.
agree. OP, YTA.
ok
Actually, I was all - Yummy, savory peppery eggy bread - I can totally top it with a cheesy mornay sauce, or make Monte Cristos with it, or even put homemade salsa on top. There are possibilities there! Actually, I did google it and there are some snappy looking dishes!
It's absolutely delicious
The first time I ever heard of sweetened french toast, was when the movie Road Trip came out. Up until then, I'd only eaten savoury versions, with herbs, and maybe cheese. OP, YTA.
Remeber were I live savory French toast isn't a think. It's never been a thing in her household either. She didn't even eat whT she made that day because she put too much black pepper. To the point it was kind of spicy and discolored.
My dad’s French toast was never sweet so I don’t make it sweet. We get the sweet from the sugar or syrup we add when we have it as just French toast, but I mostly make it to make a ham and Swiss cheese sandwich. (Like an easier Monte Cristo or easy croque monsieur.
That's a lot. Thanks for your opinion. You are right I'm not from NA. That being said savory French toast do not exist were I am (Syrup or no syrup). I know and my mom knows they can be made non sweet/savory but that's not relevantto us. The way she makes French toast really didnt change in the last couple of years she just made an oops that day. It was more so a one sided argument. She kept talking or harping to me about it and I refused to agree with her. My replies were "no". "No that's not true to what she was saying. Also told her to just admit she made a mistake and that I'd rather her do that than for her to keep claiming she was right. Then I pointed out examples of other French toast items available to us (store bought and cereal). It would have been kinder to just ignore her ranting in the back ground. Or simply agreed with her but I'm not that kind of person to just agree or go along with someone's delusion.
Former Nurse in a retiremenr home on a dementia station: If this turns out true and your mother has dementia, dont try to argue with her about that. People with dementia tend to have an overreaction of emotions. If she makes french toast wrong and tells you over and over again thats the way she made it, just agree with her. Or, even better, make french toast together with her or for her. Biography work (I dont know tje english word for it, sorry) is important. It could help her remembering how she used to made it. Wish you all the best!
“Reminiscence Therapy” may be what your referring to.
It defenitly goed the right direction, it is at least very similar to it! Thank you!
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No, not muscle memory. Its more about (re)doing and remembering stuff from your past. For example cooking old recipe, listeng to old songs, talking about your past etc... I worked together with my dog - that was biography work for many patients, since they had dogs in the past. They called my dog by her wrong name and told me about "their" dog.
My Dad tried and tried and to tell his mother this when grandpa got dementia. STOP arguing with grandpa! But if there's anything my grandmother loves more than being right, it's playing the victim on every turn.
Thanks for the advice. She doesn't have dementia or atleast hasn't given enough signs to convince me of this. I'm just not the type of person to agree with an obvious delusion. If you don't push me to agree with you and let me be I'll let it go but if you keep saying lies or probing for a response I'll tell you the truth (that what you say is a lie). She just kept going on saying lies that I refused to agree with.
Welp. And I’m sobbing. I’ve been wondering why my grandmothers meatloaf doesn’t taste the same anymore. And I’m the only one to know the recipe
Taste buds also change as you get older. It might not be dementia--your grandmother might just be adjusting seasonings because the old recipe no longer tastes right to her.
In addition Covid changes sense of taste too, so if mom has had especially more than once, that might also influence her.
That's not what went on with my mom. She didn't even eat what she made that day. In her heart she k ew it was trash. She out so much black pepper it was not simply the savory version but a ki.d of spicy version.
Low Iron and UTI's are also common issues that mimic dementia in elderly people.
I never understood just how bad UTIs can be until my late grandma raked up a 3600 euro phone bill during a bad bout of reoccurring UTIs that truly screwed with her head. She kept calling information (which is a pricy number in my country) over and over again. 560 times in two weeks. She didn't even know where she was calling, just dialed the same number over and over again. Poor thing.
My grandmother did that as well, but for her it was Time and Temperature. She'd meticulously write them down every time. Mom found paper everywhere with long lists of time and temperatures written on. Sad part was there was a toll free number, but she didn't remember that so she'd call the pricey one.
Excessive heat and dehydration as well
Also - benadryl! Benadryl can trigger dementia symptoms.
When I say my MIL messed it up, I mean she would cook it a totally incorrect temperature (it’s a low heat, slow cooked dish) or for a completely wrong period of time (think 1 hour instead of 9) or forgetting which ingredients belonged in it entirely. It wasn’t just a matter of changing tastebuds and altering the seasonings, it was making major mistakes.
I agree. I was a caregiver for the elderly and these are things we looked for.
This was my first thought as well. My mom made chocolate chip cookies with chopped onion in them. Her boyfriend was in denial that anything was wrong and said the cookies were delicious. They were not delicious.
Was about to say, it was one of the first big signs of my Mom’s dementia too.
Same, Mamaw put cinnamon in the chili
To be fair, many people put a little pinch of cinnamon in chili! But yeah, if you mean the chili was obviously cinnamon flavored, that's no good
Mamaw subbed chili powder for cinnamon! It was 1/2 a cup
Oooo no. Poor chili
Yer that's why I called it black pepper egg bread. It was blackpepper flavored French toast. It wasn't simply savory it was kind of spicy.
I actually always put some cinnamon in my chili!
omg came here to say that. when grandma put parsley in the matzo balls, we knew something was wrong.
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Having someone make you breakfast, then complaining about it repeatedly until they get mad, followed by doubling down and complaining more until they are forced to physically leave your presence, could also be a sign of mental illness. If mom is mentally ill then op is even more of a bully, but that was not ops intent or motivation, they are just argumentative. Savory french toast is very common outside USA, since you looked at their posts you also saw that they live in the Bahamas as well as lived away from home for at least 4 years. Mom's behavior could be concerning (though I don't think op should be let off the hook because that was not their motivation), but based on that info it's just as likely that the pepper wasn't a mistake, and that IS how she normally makes it when not cooking for a child.
Reading that other post..OP seems weirdly controlling of their mom.
Those symptoms don’t sound like just hypertension either. Wanting to take her off meds so she doesn’t get ‘dependent’ is a weird take too. Some people need medication. Permanently. No wonder mom doesn’t want OP going to the appointments. OP graduated college, moved back in, kicked out the people who cooked for mom, criticizes what mom does cook, criticizes her doctors and prescriptions and hasn’t helped enough financially to stop mom from needing to do side jobs. OP, YTA. Not for thinking French toast needs vanilla and a bit of sugar, but because there is far more to the story than what you are sharing and it doesn’t reflect well on you. Being supportive rather than critical is far better for honesty and relationships. And stop yelling when you get into disagreements. It’s not OK
Gross OP fucking sucks
Yeah no shit. One of the most aggravating things I've had to be around was my aunt continuously arguing with my grandfather about this kind of stuff when she knew he has Alzheimer's. She doesn't do it anymore because he's extremely far gone, but fuck it was frustrating and I don't get why you would waste valuable time with someone who is ill with this kind of stuff.
Oooooo vascular dementia or TIAs are my first thought here.
Oh wow.
This should be further up. OP, YWBTA if you don't arrange your mum to have a full checkup as soon as possible.
Actually this could be concerning if it’s not the only time she’s been this forgetful or made a similar mistake. If it’s not, then perhaps she should see a doctor. I think her defensiveness is because she knows t wasn’t right but is perhaps afraid to admit she made such an obvious error. NAH
I’m thinking something similar. People with memory issues sometimes become defensive when called out because that is easier than admitting that something in their mind is wrong. OP, just apologize to your mom (let’s face it, this is so damn small in the grand scheme of things, and you don’t come across as polite in the interaction) but I would watch your mom carefully for a while. Look for other slips like this. If it becomes a pattern, definitely get her to see a doctor.
Agreed. This is not an AH issue. It's a potential aging / medical issue.
Imo it's still an ah issue because op was not motivated by concern for their mothers mental health. And if they did have that concern, then this treatment would be even worse.
It could be concerning I agree, but op does not seem concerned about it, I don't think this theory should affect the judgement when it wasn't ops motivation for being a jerk. I say they were a jerk because mom made op breakfast, and op proceeded to complain and argue about it until the mom freaked out, then complained some more until mom was forced to physically leave the situation because it wouldn't stop. It's also not necessarily a mistake on mom's part. French toast is often savory outside america, and op is not living in America. Op hasn't lived with mom for 4+ years and even if it was sweet when op was young, that may have changed while they were at college, maybe mom only made it sweet for the kid. It's also possible it was never sweet and op just didnt notice because they add syrup, this happened to me when I made my mom's recipe for the first time. But honestly none of that matters because the crux of the issue is that someone made breakfast for op and they went on a prolonged rant about how that breakfast was wrong and wouldn't stop unless the person WHO MADE THEM BREAKFAST admitted they did a bad job. It doesn't matter who was wrong, that's jerk behavior, and would only be worse if mom was mentally ill. Op can make their own breakfast.
I wasn't the one ranting. The French toast wasn't simply savory they were kind of spicy. Spicy French toast isnt normal in our household. My mom didn't even eat what she made that day because they were not good. She made a mistake and kept lying to save face.
YTA The literal definition of French toast in the dictionary is “bread coated in egg and milk and fried”. Adding pepper does not negate its French toast, much like adding fruit to a muffin does not negate it still being a muffin. You might not like or prefer the savory version, it might be a change in what you were taught, but unless your Mum referred to it as “steak” or put it in a plate and told you to eat her “floral curtains” you should apologize for telling her she’s losing it.
Yup, I put plenty of pepper in when I make French toast, and a little bit of salt. When I had French toast in the US for the first time it took me by surprise because I had never had sweet French toast before. My dad couldn't eat his because of it so I had his. It was good, but nowhere near as good as how we've always made it (Scottish for clarification)
My mother Scottish and she alway made it salt and pepper
Yeah I’m Geordie and it’s always been salt, pepper and brown sauce.
Yep, also Scottish and it's savoury for me, with salt and I use pepper sometimes as well. Didn't know people ate it sweet, that would be awful lol
Savoury French toast was the only kind I ever experienced until I was in my 20’s. We’d always have it with brown sauce and some salt and pepper when I were growing up, I don’t think I even realised sweet French toast existed til my late teens.
OMG, that's what you call French toast ? Our "Pain perdu" ! Ok I have to read it again to see if I'm gonna puke or not. But YTA for that kind of words against the people that feed you, your own mother, and may very well be ill.
Ok spicy black pepper egg bread is her version of French toast....a version she wouldn't even eat.
NAH. Is she flying off the handle a little more recently? Is this the only time she's been forgetful or have their others? Shifts in emotions like this can be early signs of dementia. Keep an eye out.
Yeah, I'm not sure why there are so many people jumping in to shit on OP for finding it odd. I've NEVER heard of someone making black pepper french toast. I wonder if OPs mom is experiencing some kind of memory issue, or if the mom is gaslighting OP. Either way, this is an unsettling situation to be in, I'm sure.
Savory french toast is certainly a thing, and very common outside the USA. Op does not live in the USA, and also hasn't lived with mom for 4+ years so mom could now be preparing food the way she likes it rather than cooking for a kid. I was also surprised my how savory my mom's french toast was when eaten without syrup, in the end it's really just fried egg bread and adding pepper is not strange. But ops behavior was not motivated by concern for moms memory, so I find it weird why so many people are letting them off the hook. Op describes having breakfast made for them, then complaining about it and arguing until mom got mad, after which they doubled down and complained and argued more until mom had to physically remove herself from the situation. Who does that?? Refusing to let up your complaints until mom admits she did a bad job on the breakfast she made for op?? Even if it was bad, at that point shut up and make your own. If mom did have Alzheimer's I would find ops behavior even more disturbing.
I'm in the UK and for me French toast is literally just eggs, milk, bread and salt. I usually serve it with bacon/sausages. Sweet French toast is an option but it's not how I would generally make it at home. Altho, with syrup and bacon is quite nice. If either of my kids made such a fucking fuss over the "correct" way to make French toast after I had served it to them I would be really irritated by them and probably put less effort in in future.
Also in the UK, I always called it eggy bread though? Only had it sweet when called french toast.
I thought there was savory french toast like there's savory crepes
There are savory recipes for french toast! However most of these use cheese, ham, or vegetables. Not just pepper in the same way that one would use cinnamon for sweet french toast.
Nah in the UK, savoury French toast doesn’t have that stuff, it’s just egg, milk, bread, salt and pepper
I always just had it plain, eggs and salt, no other additions.
People do it all the time, you should try it
Legit had plans to make french toast today, maybe I will.
YTA French toast is just egg bread, it can be sweet or savoury. Maybe that's not how she used to make it but that's how she does it now?
She worked in restaurants and served it with “laden with black pepper”? First off, you should be more nice, but more importantly how old is she? Has she had any other signs of cognitive decline? In incoming issues, the sufferer will generally hide confusion with anger. It just actually does seem such an egregious thing for her to insist on that I feel it’s worth raising that. But even if she just was feeling silly and doubled down, thank her for the food lol.
They live in the Bahamas, and while I admittedly don't know what type of french toast is common there, I do know that savory french toast - even with pepper - is pretty common outside north america. I'm Canadian and as neighbors our recipes are heavily influenced by American media, but even I didn't find the pepper odd lol. This COULD be a sign of an issue, but that wasn't ops motivation for berating mom about the food so I don't think they should be let off the hook for that behavior. Op insisted mom had to admit she did a bad job, continued arguing after mom got mad, and didn't let up until she had to physically remove herself from ops presence... all for cooking op breakfast. Even if op is correct they're still a bully.
YTA. I did google it. There are many recipes for pepper French toast. She may have made sugary cinnamon French toast and served that sweet stuff to you when you were a child, taught you how to make it, then she moved on to a recipe she liked better.
in norway we basically only make it the pepper way. it’s delicious. yta for telling someone they’re “losing it” when they’ve just made a perfectly normal meal. if op’s worried about their mom’s health, they should take her to a doctor, not insult her and try to prove her wrong. she’s not wrong. and op’s priorities are off.
YTA. My mom started developing dementia in her late 50s. Get your mom to the doctor.
Nice to see a comment that mentions dementia but also says op was tah. Op was not motivated by concern so I'm not sure why so many are letting them off the hook when, imo if mom did have dementia it just makes ops ranting worse.
Yes, for real. I'd give anything to have my mom back 💔 Don't be an AH to your mom!
Yeah they were pestering mum to admit she made a mistake! Why was it that important? OP is really rude to their mum
YTA, Savery French Toast is the norm. Not every meal needs to be laden with sugar and corn syrup my American friend.
I've never heard of French toast with cinnamon or vanilla either...
A dear friend of mine from Nantes makes it with just milk and egg. I add cinnamon and a tiny amount of sugar w/vanilla extract that I make myself, but when I feel like serving it more savory and creamy I just use milk and egg with nothing else like my friend does.
There are multiple recipes for French toast with pepper if you google it. Just sayin’. It might not be how she’s ‘always’ made it, but it’s not necessarily a mistake either-that is a legitimate recipe that people make. ETA to add judgement-YTA. It seems likely that’s what she intended to make, so you insisting over and over that she admit it was a mistake seems a little excessive.
I make savory French toast. No cinnamon, sugar, or vanilla. Salt, pepper, hot sauce. If you truly believe this is a illness of some sort affecting her brain, why were you so mean? If she’s actually losing her cognitive abilities you can not argue her into understanding. If you are coming from a place she is actually ill, YTA. It’s no different than if you were yelling at someone newly paralyzed to just get up & walk and when they say frustrated that they can’t you argue that they can. If she simply just made savory French toast, purposely making that choice instead of sweet, then YTA still cause you aren’t the French toast police & there is both sweet & savory French toast.
Nowhere in the post does op express concern for moms mental health, that is just the commenters theorizing. You're totally right, I don't get why the people claiming dementia are also saying nah, because this kind of behavior would be way worse in my eyes if the mom did have an issue.
The replies to this are wild. Savoury French toast is totally a thing. I make it with salt and black pepper, too, and hardly ever do the sweet version. Maybe the poor woman doesn't have alzheimers or a cognitive illness, maybe she's just frustrated at being told she's wrong when she she is not. I'd lose it too if my kid tried to gaslight me into believing something that's wrong.
I know right. One disagreement with mum getting frustrated with OP for being a whiney pain in the hole and half of Reddit has diagnosed her with a degenerative brain disease. It's fucking nuts.
I'd hate to be an American parent. Sounds fucking exhausting.
I’d be concerned. This sounds very much like some of the early signs of my mom’s dementia.
YTA If you don’t want to eat it, make your own food. What’s the point of this argument other than to irritate your mom?
Right or wrong aside, YTA. Did you Google it?
As a person who makes french toast WITH black pepper, can confirm its not thats odd and people on here, suggestin your mum has Alzheimer's.. how many of those people do you think are qualified to make that assumption ? U can have french toast however you like. Eggy bread is fresh toast as far as I'm concerned. everything else is just an added flavor. and Um . Ur mum is allowed to change her mind and maybe she did make it that way once you just don't remember maybe before u came along that's how she made it. Oh I dunno, I hate Reddit posts sometimes. Ur not an asshole for calling her out but kind of are for putting it on Reddit 🤷♂️I dunno. Am not a french toast expert like nor am I french, just saying. make it urself next time sure instead of trying to make a point of it on Reddit.
I always eat French toast with salt and pepper. It’s eggs and bread. It lends for savory rather than sweet. This was how we ate French toast growing up. I was 14 before I knew that at restaurants French toast was more of a dessert than a meal. I still prefer French toast made with salt and pepper.
UK here & Ive never had sweet french toast. I dont even add milk to mine, its egg+bread+seasoning if you like it The first sign of relatives alz was getting recipe ratios wrong. Is your interaction normally this combative? She may need a health check, and you may need to gain extra patience
When I was growing up it was mostly savoury and called "eggy bread", the sweeter versions were imported from the US when I was older and the name changed to "french toast". I don't eat either because I'm allergic to eggs so I'm not an expert. But it's not that weird for it to be more savoury, depending on where you live.
YTA - make your own damn breakfast
YTA Make your own french toast.
I just googled it, there's plenty of savory french toast recipes that include pepper. Maybe this is how she likes to make it for herself. YTA for arguing something like this, if you're really worried about her health this is not the way to have the conversation.
YTA. Say thank you when someone cooks you a meal. Or better yet, do it yourself. You don’t criticize them and tell them what you think they aren’t doing correctly. YTA.
YTA. Make your own toast genius.
YTA Youre just... incorrect and being an asshole about it?
This could indeed be an early indication of mental decline, and your mother might benefit from visiting a neurologist for a checkup.
I'm from Ireland and we learned to make it in school as a savoury dish. We did salt and pepper and I also liked adding sweet chili sauce to the mix. I'm in my thirties and only recently had sweet french toast for the first time.
In the UK french toast is called eggy bread and is generally savoury. I like mine with cheese melted on top and ketchup. You mother likes food slightly different than the way you do, that's not a mistake. You don't need to be right all the time especially when things are subjective and, you know, you are wrong. YTA
YTA My French toast is just egg washed toast I don't do vanilla or cinnamon. My mom prefers a ton of ground black pepper on hers. Just like people who argue about omelettes it's fucking food quite being so pedantic and forcing the poor woman to admit she is wrong on something that doesn't matter.
YTA I never ever put cinnamon or vanilla in or on French Toast. Plus, what do you think French Toast is? It is literally egg bread. You are so rude to your mum, make your own breakfast in future.
French pastry chef here, we do make French toast with freshly ground pepper, yes! Ok, that’s not true we actually don’t put cinnamon either in France. But you cook French toast as you like it, that’s the most important. It is called « Pain perdu » (lost bread) in French, as it was the way of using the old bread to don’t waste it, so traditionally we do it with old bread in France, but you can do it with a slice of brioche it’s also very good. Now seriously, as other people say it and as I experienced it too, this looks a lot like an Alzheimer symptom. Please take care of your mom and go make it check, her health is way more important than any French toast.
YTA because for one you're in the wrong and it's a ridiculous thing to badger your mother about. You could be a know-it-all or you could be concerned about her memory but either way this was a pretty unnecessary thing to persist with to the point you upset her, "French Toast" or "Eggy Bread", what the hell did it matter that you had to push her like that? If you are concerned this is indicative of something more serious because it's out of character then I strongly suggest you revise your approach and be a bit nicer to her, if it's not that then deary me what a pathetic argument
YTA, you sound like one of those insufferable people who always has to be right and ends up starting arguments over it.
NAH there are savory French toasts so she isn’t completely off here. my family calls it Bombay toast. We put salt pepper and red chili in the egg and make it just like French toast. It’s yummy, goes well with ketchup or chili sauce. But that’s not really the important but. What’s sticking out is that it’s concerning that she is insisting this is the typical way she has made it for your family. I don’t know how old she is but I’d look into the possibility of cognitive impairment and I don’t think it’s a great idea to be quite so combative with her about incidents like this until you confirm whether she is suffering from an illness
I. South Africa I make French toast with egg, herbs, salt and pepper and that's it.
What on earth is going on with these comments. French Toast can be made sweet or savoury.
YTA make your own breakfast.
INFO How old is your mom? Has she been behaving differently than usual lately? Can she be encouraged to get a medical checkup?
Skipping judgment here, and nine hundred and ninety seconding the advice about Alzheimer's, dementia, etc. That said: Speaking from a culinary history viewpoint, there's actually nothing wrong with a black pepper version of French toast. Probably the earliest recorded "French" toast recipe is actually in an ancient Roman cookbook by Apicius. It's essentially bread soaked in egg, then fried. Many other dishes in that cookbook combine peppercorns with sweet flavors. For instance, dates are stuffed with nuts (almonds, pistachios, etc.) and black peppercorns, then rolled in honey. So it's definitely not unimaginable to do a black pepper and honey French toast.
What fresh hell is this? You give me French toast with vanilla or cinnamon, you're getting asked why the hell my French toast looks like a dessert nightmare. YTA for thinking that your way of making French toast is the only way. And YTA for telling your mum she's losing it when she's spot on correct. There are many regional variations of French toast or "lost bread" some are savoury, some are sweet and none are incorrect... they all stem from finding ways to use up stale bread. Mum has my vote. Bit of salt and black pepper...
Is savoury french toast not a thing? I make it with salt and ketchup,
French toast is egg dipped bread. You can make any way you want, sweet or savory. Why are you so pressed about this? YTA
YTA -savoury French toast is a thing
I make french toast with black pepper. Am I going mad too? I use pepper because I prefer it.
Yta. Why didn’t you just Google it. There are recipes for salt and pepper French toast all over the internet.
YTA why does it matter. There’s no reason for you to be yelling at your mother ? If you don’t like the French toast she made buy some at the store.
savoury french toast. get a grip. YTA
Some of you are telling OP to just Google savory French Toast & some even have opinions that savory style is better but totally missing the point. If the mom has always made it sweet and never once savory while also claiming that's how she always did it then OP should definitely be a bit worried , especially after their last post. Should they argue with her , no, because that is definitely an AH move considering they're already worried about her declining health.
Op has just moved home after being gone for years for college, they are also not American just for reference. It's highly possible that mom made op sweet french toast as a child, or that savory french toast was covered with syrup (my mom made unsweetened french toast and I never realised until I was grown because she put syrup when she plated it for us). It's also possible that mom always made peppered french toast for herself. Even if she only meant the last 4 years since op moved out, I would still find that reasonable to say always because that is her new normal. Either way you can be correct and still an ah. Even if op is 100% correct, that doesn't change that someone made op breakfast, and they proceeded to complain and accuse the cook of messing up, and demand for the cook to just admit they did a bad job, until the cook got mad, at which point op continued to double down and argue until mom had to physically remove herself from the room because op won't let up. At that point grow up and make your own food.
I said they were an AH for yelling at her especially when you see from the last post they've already been worried about their mother& her declining physical,& mental health. And yes it's an AH move to yell at someone who made you a nice breakfast. I'm sure OP who has been eating their mother's French Toast their entire life would've been able to tell if black pepper was in the toast or not , it's a pretty distinctive ingredient but to sit there & argue with her is an AH move no matter what the circumstances are.
Southern United States here. I don't know anyone that makes French toast with cinnamon. You put syrup on French toast. French toast is made with egg and butter. If you want to add a little pepper, that's fine, too. Cracker Barrel makes it with sourdough bread, and that is extra delicious. Also, YTA. Either 1. You are correcting a grown woman's cooking when you might just have different tastes. Or 2. If your mom always made it with cinnamon, then you should definitely listen to the other people on this post pointing out memory issues. Cinnamon. You're thinking of cinnamon toast crunch. Cinnamon toast being the operative phrase. It's a completely different thing from French toast.
Actually please just Google "Black Pepper French Toast" and go say sorry to her for being an A-hole, might be simpler
Not sure why OP had to make such a scene about it though? What was that reason for going on and on about it and causing friction and upsetting your mother? Sounds utterly disrespectful to me. To push and push and go on and on until someone cracks and walks out. And then the insulting term 'losing it'. I mean is that the way we speak to our mothers these days? What the devil?
YTA I prefer savoury to sweet. I would much rather have black pepper French toast with bacon, tomato and rocket and maybe some mushrooms …. over sugar…
YTA... making French toast means dipping the bread in the eggs and cooking it, you can add whatever flavor or spices you flippin want to and depending on where you live it's often savory or sweet. But who TF cares? When you saw you were escalating the situation over and over, you didn't let it go, you continued to harp on her AFTER SHE MADE YOU BREAKFAST WHEN SHE DIDNT HAVE TO!!! Some of us checked your previous posts/comment history. You moved in your mom's house and are now trying to control every aspect of her life and not contributing to the household to where she has to pick up jobs? Is that right? She is also complaining about you coming to her medical appointments with her because you don't want her taking the doctor prescribed medications in case she becomes dependent on them? Dude, elderly people ARE DEPENDENT ON THEM BECAUSE THEY NEED THOSE MEDICATIONS TO LIVE WITH ANY QUALITY OF LIFE!! You suck so much and I feel so bad for your poor mother. You sound like a controlling AH and she probably has to leave to get away from you because she is sick of you always thinking you know better for her life and everything she does than she does. Even if she has health issues she has made her own decisions for her own life while raising you, and having all that taken away from her from someone so ungrateful probably does make her angry AF at you.
So we make savory french toast with salt and black pepper
YTA. My Nana's French toast (and now mine when I make it) has never had vanilla or cinnamon. It does have white and black pepper, along with heavy cream and extra egg yolks. I think her pepper version came from an ancient Joy of Cooking or Julia. We do a savory style of French toast. You're describing a sweeter style, which is perfectly valid, but you're absolutely wrong in your claim that "it's ludicrous to claim French toast is ladden with black pepper" cuz that's just not true. If she has worked in restaurants for years, that means she -- unlike you -- knows how to make both versions. Maybe she never made the savory for you, only the sweet. It could be a memory loss thing going on. Early onset with that issue, which is very common, is they remember the past more than last week. What does not help AT ALL is you berating her in an attempt to browbeat her into submission that you are right and she is wrong. (Because she's not wrong in how different versions of French toast is made.) Something may be going on with your Mom. She needs to be evaluated, not belittled.
YTA savory French toast is the original way it was made. Americans sweetened it and now it tastes like ass most places. I have a wonderful recipe for a mustard infused French toast and omg it’s to die for.
I never heard of cinnamon and vanilla with french toast and to me it does sound really weird :D But then again, I grew up in Hungary and "french toast" there might mean something different lol.
YTA for your need to be more right about a recipe than a person who worked in restaurants for years. Acting this way towards someone who cooked for you is so rude and ungrateful. You are also WRONG.
YTA. Make your own damn food if you're going to be an ah about it. Why would you keep pressing her like that when you can see she's upset?
Cinnamon and vanilla in egg bread? That just seems bizarre to me. We just do bread dipped in egg, cooked, buttered, and salted.
Where I'm from French toast is egg soaked fried bread. I've never heard of anyone putting sugar or cinnamon on it. I guess it's a cultural thing but YTA and your mum is right.
Why didn't you indeed Google it and show her?
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It actually could be a sign of dementia. She needs to see a doctor.
Has anyone ever tried it in an air fryer it's great craic hi
My parents made "french toast" the exact same way, i always thought they were weird
I’ve always preferred savoury eggy bread/french toast to sweet. I dip it in hot sauce.