milk
milk [milk milks milked milking] noun, verb BrE [mɪlk] NAmE [mɪlk]
noun uncountable
1. the white liquid produced by cows, ↑goats and some other animals as food for their young and used as a drink by humans
•a pint/litre of milk
•a bottle/carton of milk
•fresh/dried/powdered milk
• Do you take milk in your tea?
•milk products (= butter, cheese, etc.)
see also ↑buttermilk, ↑condensed milk, ↑evaporated milk, ↑malted milk, ↑skimmed milk
2. the white liquid that is produced by women and female ↑mammals for feeding their babies
•breast milk
3. the white juice of some plants and trees, especially the ↑coconut
see also ↑soya milk
more at cry over spilt milk at ↑cry v., the land of milk and honey at ↑land n.
Word Origin:
Old English milc, milcian, of Germanic origin; related to Dutch melk and German Milch, from an Indo-European root shared by Latin mulgere and Greek amelgein ‘to milk’.
Example Bank:
•Don't drink the milk— it's off.
•Dried milk keeps better than fluid milk.
•She expressed some milk so her husband could do the night feeding.
•The milk has gone off/turned sour.
•They've stopped delivering milk in our area.
•a calcium-fortified milk which provides more calcium than regular milk
•a can of condensed milk
Idiom: ↑milk of human kindness
verb
1. ~ sth to take milk from a cow, ↑goat, etc.
2. (disapproving)to obtain as much money, advantage, etc. for yourself as you can from a particular situation, especially in a dishonest way
•~ A (from B) She's milked a small fortune from the company over the years.
•~ B (of A) She's milked the company of a small fortune.
•I know he's had a hard time lately, but he's certainly milking it for all it's worth (= using it as an excuse to do things that people would normally object to).
see milk/suck sb/sth dry at ↑dry n.
Verb forms: 
Word Origin:
Old English milc, milcian, of Germanic origin; related to Dutch melk and German Milch, from an Indo-European root shared by Latin mulgere and Greek amelgein ‘to milk’.
Example Bank:
•He had milked her for information.
•I know he's had a hard time lately, but he's certainly milking it for all it's worth.
•These large firms milk the government of subsidies.
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