[Sca-cooks] Re: cold cereal and milk

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

On Jan 22, 2006, at 1:18 PM, RUTH EARLAND wrote:

> OK. At first, I thought this thread might be a bit out there. But  
> on reflection, I can definitely see how this is definitely on  
> topic, if not necessarily period.
>
> Using one of those leaps of logic we all so detest, I hypothesize  
> that putting milk on cold cereal was a natural evolutionary  
> progression from putting milk on porrige.
>
> Berelinde,
> slightly flip speculatory historian

There's probably some connection (and probably the same connection to  
the fact that, once upon a time, there were people who would put  
cream on dry/cold cereal). I also recall that a lot of the older  
commercial cold cereals (things like Kellogg's Corn Flakes, Grape  
Nuts, etc.) were invented as part of a 19th-century health-food  
revolution, and were originally promoted as spa/sanitorium foods for  
those with weak digestions. Check out the writings of Dr. John Harvey  
Kellogg, or even see the only slightly exaggerated film version, "The  
Road To Wellville".

I wouldn't be at all surprised if there isn't also a connection with  
the various pap dishes that were used for those with bad digestion,  
the elderly, and children, such as bread-and-milk, toast  crumbled  
into milk (a.k.a. milktoast), biscuits or cornbread treated in the  
same way (possibly with buttermilk).

Adamantius




"S'ils n'ont pas de pain, vous fait-on dire, qu'ils  mangent de la  
brioche!" / "If there's no bread to be had, one has to say, let them  
eat cake!"
     -- attributed to an unnamed noblewoman by Jean-Jacques Rousseau,  
"Confessions", 1782

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