Croque Monsieur vs. Croque Madame

Croque Monsieur was invented in Paris in the early 1900s. It appeared on the first menu in 1910 at the Bel Age, a bistro on the boulevard des Capucins in Paris. The exact origin story will never be known and quite frankly who cares. Two quickly researched theories suggest that either a French worker accidentally left his lunch pail near a radiator and it melted his Jambon Beurre, creating the world’s first Croque monsieur.

The other theory is far more elaborate and may involve cannibalism. The story begins with a resourceful brasserie chef who unexpectedly ran out of baguettes, so he substitutes pain de mie, the French equivalent to our white bread. He toasts the bread because the horror of horrors no self-respecting Frenchmen could ever eat bread without a crust. One guest was so enthusiastic about this creation that he inquired the chef about it. The chef sarcastically pointed towards the town butcher, who is conveniently eating at a nearby table and mutters: “that’s Monsieur’s meat”. At the time, Bel Age was rumored to serve human meat so perhaps this story came from an early fake Yelp review.