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• milk toast
  milk toast

  noun

  toast, usually buttered, served in hot milk with sugar or with salt and pepper.
• milk-toast
  milk-toast

  adjective

  easily dominated; extremely mild; ineffectual; namby-pamby; wishy-washy.

milk toast

¹ American  

noun

1. toast, usually buttered, served in hot milk with sugar or with salt and pepper.

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milk-toast ² American  

[milk-tohst] / ˈmɪlkˌtoʊst /

adjective

1. easily dominated; extremely mild; ineffectual; namby-pamby; wishy-washy.

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noun

1. milquetoast.

Etymology

Origin of milk toast¹

An Americanism dating back to 1850–55

Origin of milk-toast²

First recorded in 1815–25

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

milk toast milk-toast

We do not need to staff the CIA with Mister or Ms milk toast.

From New York Times ● Apr. 20, 2018

He savored a final meal of eggs and grits, apple juice and milk, toast and a sweet doughnut stick.

From New York Times ● Sep. 30, 2012

Leach's attorneys also claim that Hance twice told the attorney investigating the mistreatment complaint to change her report because it was "too mild" and "too milk toast," court documents show.

From Newsweek ● Apr. 16, 2010

To those who recalled Thurman Arnold's highly seasoned attacks on sinister Nazi influences on U.S. business, the wording of Justice's victorious announcement tasted like milk toast.

From Time Magazine Archive

Cereal and milk, toast, bacon, fried eggs—the smells of breakfast seemed to hang over the raft.

From "The River" by Gary Paulsen

As Taft had said, it was no milk-toast affair.

From Time Magazine Archive

Opening it, he admitted a waiter with a tray containing some steaming milk-toast.

From The Cottage of Delight A Novel by Will N. (William Nathaniel) Harben

They had served him with some milk-toast, scanty fare for a boy who had missed two meals, and he had promptly turned over and gone to sleep.

From The Crimson Sweater by Ralph Henry Barbour

Jeb was just passing with a basket of newly laid eggs, and Sary was leaning over Mr. Brewster's back with a deep dish of milk-toast that she expected to place before him.

From Polly and Eleanor by Harold S. Barbour

We stayed at Divinerries' six months until one night Peter Boyce Wendell, the columnist, ate his milk-toast there.

From Flappers and Philosophers by F. Scott (Francis Scott) Fitzgerald