NO FRENCH TOAST, NO PROPER BREAKFAST ABOARD.

That's been where I stand.  "Railroad French Toast predates Amtrak, and there used to be regional variations in the railroads' recipes (yes, each dining department had its own recipes, and regional food items). And cutting costs by antagonizing passengers doesn't seem like a sensible business strategy."

There are people at Amtrak who recognize, within limitations, the reality of my claim.

In passenger train advocacy circles French toast has come to symbolize what is right and wrong about dining aboard Amtrak.

When it is available on the breakfast menu passenger train advocates tend to be pleased. When it is not, they are upset.

Over the years French toast has come and gone from Amtrak dining car menus.

It made a comeback in traditional dining cars on western long-distance trains last summer and is now available on the menu of eastern long distance trains, too.

It was one of a number of additions that Amtrak quietly made to its flexible dining menu last year that increased the number of hot offerings for all meals.

But not all French toast is the same. Just read the menu descriptions for it on the traditional and flexible dining menus.

It's not wise to make Passenger Rail advocates angry, and yet the people managing Amtrak seem bent on continuing to do so.

What the menus don’t say is that in traditional dining cars the French toast is created on board by a chef. In flexible dining cars all food is created off the train by a catering company and heated onboard.

Some passenger train advocates are still angry about Amtrak’s downgrading of dining service aboard eastern long distance trains starting in June 2018.

It was widely viewed as a cost-cutting move and resulted in fewer choices for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Further ruffling the feathers of passenger train advocates has been the limiting of dining car service to sleeping car passengers on all trains. Coach passengers were left to buy whatever is available in the café car.

The situation is not much better for lunch, for dinner, for coach passengers on any train, or for passengers on the eastern trains.