Welsh cuisine butter was the primary cooking medium and basis for sauces. Salt was an important ingredient in Welsh butter, but also in early Welsh cheeses, which would sit in brine during the cheesemaking process. The Welsh were also early adopters of roasting cheese. An early incarnation of Welsh rarebit was being made in medieval times, and by the middle of the 15th century rarebit was considered a national dish. The acid soil of Wales meant that the milk produced by their cattle created a soft cheese, which was not as good for roasting, so Welsh people would trade for harder cheeses
Dream of the Rarebit Fiend "Daydreams and Nightmares" (Fantagraphics, 1988/2006; editor Richard Marschall), a collection of miscellaneous work by McCay. Checker Books reprinted many of the "Rarebit Fiend" strips over eight volumes of the series "Winsor McCay: Early Works" and in 2006 reprinted 183 of the color Saturday strips in "Dream of the Rarebit Fiend: The Saturdays". The Checker books reprinted all but about 300 of the known "Rarebit Fiend" strips. In July 2007, German art historian Ulrich Merkl self-published a , 464-page volume called "Dream of the Rarebit Fiend", reproducing 369 of the strips in full size. Previous reprintings of the strip reduced the