People Can't Agree On The Name For The End Of A Loaf Of Bread

Say you're in the mood for a sandwich, and any sandwich will do. Whether it's ham and cheese, peanut butter and jelly, egg salad — it doesn't matter. You're just in the mood for something quick, easy, and filling enough to hold you over until dinner. You pull out your loaf of bread and there are only two more slices left; what luck! As you open the bag, you find that your good fortune was misjudged, as both of those pieces are the first and last slices of the loaf. Those are the crusty, dried-up-looking squares always left in the bag, cautiously avoided by the rest of the household. You're not exactly sure why no one eats them, but, for whatever reason, you decide that you're not hungry for a sandwich after all and decide to wait until dinner to eat.

The purpose of those end pieces is to keep the rest of the loaf from drying out and going stale, according to online bread experts on Reddit, and there's plenty of things you can do with them, from making breadcrumbs to keeping brown sugar soft (via Wide Open Eats). But no one can agree on what to call the end slices of bread. From households to social media to cookbooks, it seems that there are many names to call the food that no one wants to eat in the first place. That's why when a famous actor tweeted about the slice of bread, people spiraled into a heated debate on Twitter.

When British actor Stephen Mangan tweeted about his breakfast ritual in December 2018, he didn't think he would create a Twitter storm. He shared that he always used the end piece of bread to make toast, calling it a "quiet and selfless act of heroism." According to Today, the tweet started a debate on what to call the end slice of bread. Despite Mangan arguing the correct term was "heel," others weren't so sure.

Some Twitter users were eager to demean the slice of bread, calling it the "crust," or in more searing terms, "a waste of dough." Some backed the bread slice, noting that when toasted, the end piece was perfect for a deliciously buttery treat. At this point, the conversation seemingly evolved into a discussion on the unique cultural terms used for the end slice.

"I call it the skalk like the good Norwegian my grandma taught me to be," shared one Norwegian tweeter. Another European tweeter gave off a list of colloquial names from Ireland and Scotland, such as "toppers," "knobblers," and "knobs". Other colorful terms included in the debate were "bumper," "butt," "outsider," "nut end," "noggie," and oddly, "Norbert". Whatever your preference may be, perhaps one good use of the end slice is bringing out how creative we can get with silly names.