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Breakfast

Milk Toast

Milk Toast is a breakfast dish made by pouring a boiled milk and butter mixture over toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Gibson, Marietta Fauntleroy Hollyday, "Mrs. C. H. Gibson." · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

Milk Toast

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Boil one quart of milk.

  2. Stir in three ounces of butter, mixed with one teaspoonful of corn starch and one salt spoonful of salt.

  3. Let the mixture boil for five minutes.

Serve

  1. Have ready a few slices of toast.

  2. Pour the hot milk mixture over the toast.

  3. Serve hot.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

149Calories
8 gProtein
8 gFat
12 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 2 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Gibson, Marietta Fauntleroy Hollyday, "Mrs. C. H. Gibson.". Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Milk
Forms the liquid base that becomes the creamy sauce poured over the toast.
Butter (in the method)
Adds richness and fat, giving the sauce a smooth, silky mouthfeel.
Corn starch
Thickens the boiling milk so the sauce coats the toast rather than running off.

The step that matters

Adding the corn starch mixture to the boiling milk. Corn starch must be mixed with the butter first and then stirred into hot liquid, then boiled. Starch granules swell and thicken only once heated, and boiling fully gelatinises them, so the sauce thickens evenly without lumps.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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