Milk Toast and a Scary Photo

When I was little, my mom made milk toast whenever we were sick. It was a sure-fire cure to get you back on your feet!! Why??? Because it was disgusting! You'd rather pretend to be well than eat it. However, my mom always said it would cure "what ails you." So....some 40 years later....I made the call to my Mom that I thought I would never, ever make.....I called and asked for Milk Toast!!! I must really be sick.

Milk toast is a breakfast food consisting of toasted bread and sugar dipped in or covered in hot milk into which a small amount of butter has been melted. Cinnamon and raisins may be added. Milk toast was a popular food throughout the late 19th century and early 20th century, especially for young children and for the ailing, for whom the food was thought to be soothing and easy to digest. Although not as popular today, milk toast is still considered a comfort food.

Milk toast's soft blandness inspired the timid and ineffectual comic strip character Caspar Milquetoast, drawn by Harold Webster from 1924 to 1952. The term "milquetoast" has since adopted a new meaning: a timid, shrinking, apologetic person.