Melba toast is a dry, crisp and thinly sliced rusk, often served with soup and salad or topped with either melted cheese or pâté.

The hotel proprietor César Ritz supposedly named it in a conversation with Escoffier.

These thin slices are then returned to the grill with the untoasted sides towards the heat source, resulting in toast half the normal thickness.

[5] Melba toast is also available commercially, and was at one time given to infants who were teething as a hard food substance on which to chew.

[7] In 1925, the Mayo Brothers prescribed the "Eighteen Day Reducing Diet" to Ethel Barrymore.