The Kentucky Hot Brown at 100: Its History and How to Make It at Home

Few dishes are as tied to one city as the Hot Brown is to Louisville. It is an open-faced sandwich of roast turkey on toast, covered in a rich cheese sauce, broiled until bubbling and finished with bacon. It turns 100 this year, and the hotel where it was born has spent 2026 celebrating.

A Jazz Age invention

The Brown Hotel has stood in downtown Louisville since 1923. In the 1920s, crowds gathered there on weekend nights to dance into the early hours. Forbes, describing the dish's origin, puts the crowd at about 1,200 guests. When the band stopped, hungry dancers went downstairs to the restaurant, where the usual late-night offering was ham and eggs.

One night in 1926, according to Louisville Tourism, chef Fred K. Schmidt tried something new. He used roast turkey, slices of toast and a pot of Mornay sauce to build an open-faced sandwich, broiled it until golden and topped it with crisp bacon. Louisville Tourism suggests it may have been inspired by Welsh rarebit or the croque-monsieur. It was an immediate hit, and as Saveur tells it, the dish spread to other Louisville restaurants and then across Kentucky.

What makes a Hot Brown a Hot Brown

At the Brown Hotel, the details are fixed. Saveur reports that one slice of toast is cut into two triangles and the other is left square so it fits the oval baking dish. The bacon goes on top in a crisscross, the Roma tomatoes sit on the side, and the Mornay sauce gets its depth from hand-grated Pecorino Romano. The two-handled oval dish, Saveur notes, is as essential to a Hot Brown as a silver cup is to a mint julep.

The Brown Hotel recipe, for two

Louisville Tourism publishes the hotel's recipe. These are the ingredients for two servings:

Method, in brief

1. Make the sauce. Melt the butter in a two-quart saucepan, whisk in the flour, and cook the roux gently for a couple of minutes. Whisk in the cream and milk and heat until it just simmers. Off the heat, whisk in the cheese until smooth, then season with nutmeg, salt and pepper.
2. Build each dish. In an oven-safe dish, lay one square slice of toast and one slice cut into triangles. Cover with half the turkey and set tomato halves alongside.
3. Sauce and broil. Pour half the Mornay over each dish, scatter more Pecorino on top, and broil until the cheese browns and bubbles.
4. Finish. Cross two slices of bacon on top, dust with paprika and parsley, and serve right away.

Forbes's centennial version, also credited to Louisville Tourism and the Brown Hotel, uses less butter and flour and all cream. Either way, the key is a smooth sauce and a hot broiler. A cast-iron skillet works if you do not own the oval dish.

A century of variations

Louisville has never been shy about reinventing the Hot Brown. Saveur reports that Biscuit Belly swaps in homemade biscuits for the toast, Noosh Nosh adds queso and chorizo, and the Sidebar at Whiskey Row serves a Hot Brown burger. For the centennial, the Brown Hotel itself added a Hot Brown dip, quesadilla, wontons and loaded fries. Louisville Tourism also points visitors to the city's annual Hot Brown Week.

The original is still served in the hotel dining room where it was created, which is worth a visit on any Louisville trip.

Bring the Hot Brown home

If the Hot Brown is a fixture at your Derby party or the day after Thanksgiving, a few Kentucky pieces make it feel official. The Legendary Hot Brown recipe cutting board puts the recipe in your kitchen and makes a good gift for the family cook. For more Kentucky classics, All-Time Favorite Recipes from Kentucky Cooks and Tim Farmer's Country Kitchen Cookbook are full of home cooking from around the state.

Serve the meal on a bourbon barrel charcuterie board, and if you want a side, bake a batch of Weisenberger biscuits. It is the same idea Biscuit Belly built its version around. A hundred years on, Chef Schmidt's late-night improvisation is still one of the best reasons to turn on the broiler.