Raw Milk: Bringing The Farm To The City

One of the most satisfying things to come about since embarking on the “traditional foods or real foods” movement is that I have been able to source nearly all our food from the farmer, in a 100 mile radius. Although we were eating mostly local already,  many of these items were bought at our local health food store rather than directly from the farmer. Not only have I found that our food bill has decreased from “bar code free’ shopping, we also are consuming foods exactly as nature intended. This has been incredibly satisfying. So far, we know the farmers for our pasture raised eggs, grass fed/pasture raised meat, raw cheese, veggies and fruit, pasture raised turkeys, duck and chicken and even the farm where our milk comes from. Yup, even our milk.

One of the common factors in the healthy societies Weston Price studied was the consumption of whole raw milk. This has been a hard point for me to ignore. I have said before that I am not a milk drinker. I don’t feed my kids milk either because it would take a lot to convince me that milk, as it is sold in stores,  is a healthy choice for my family due to the excessive processing and heat applied to milk , not to mention ultra-pasteurizing to make milk last longer on the shelves. Any benefit conventional milk may have is lost and the result is a product that the body finds hard to digest. I would argue that conventional milk is derived from such appalling living conditions (hormones, constant lactation, lack of pasture and grain fed) I wonder if there really is any health benefit in the first place. Even “organic milk” does not guarantee that the animal is pasture raised, feeding on grass instead of grains. This whole traditional foods journey has really taught me a lot about the flaws in the “organic” brand and the importance of grass raised food.

The common argument for milk is the calcium and vitamin D factor but raw milk enthusiasts would argue that vitamin D and calcium in any digestible and abundant fashion only exists in milk from cows that have been properly raised; on a pasture and eating grass for the majority of their lives – not grain. Plus, I’m not in favor of consuming any products that have been synthetically fortified, as in the case with conventional milk. Although my vegetarian days would argue that only humans drink milk past infancy, many regard raw milk as health promoting especially in the areas of asthma and allergies, as well as regarding raw milk as sacred food. I recently read about a mother who created her own formula using raw goat milk and nourished her “failure to thrive” son back to health.

Dr. G. Z. Pitskhelauri, famous Russian gerontologist, based his book The Long Living of Soviet Georgia on underlying reasons for the super longevity of residents of Georgia, supposedly the home of more 100 year olds (and older) than any other area of the world…Startling is the word for their typical diet, which contains two main items that are almost taboo in this country: fatty meats and whole milk products, as well as native sauces, herbs, various vegetable greens and a moderate amount of natural wines (nonsulphured) James F. Scheer – Health Freedom News and quoted in Nourishing Traditions

I have sat on the fence for a few years on whether we should begin drinking raw milk. Much of my hesitation is due to the lingering fear (due to effective marketing I might add) that raw milk is “dangerous” (FDA PowerPoint) to consume. But lets remember for a moment that thousands of generations have been consuming raw milk from their own cows or the local farmer. So who stands to gain by convincing us that raw milk is inherently unsafe?

There is no way I would consider raw milk from a conventional source. You bet it should be pasteurized due to living in a degrading environment, but raw milk from pasture raised grass eating cows that I can meet myself? Although there may be risk with raw milk, there also is risk with other foods such as deli meats, spinach and peanut butter (cough cough…ahem!) In fact, according to a Point-by-Point Rebuttal to the FDA,  much of the food recalls and illnesses occur with food that has been pasteurized!

We have decided to bet our money on the healthy benefits of drinking raw milk. Is raw milk sustainable for the majority of the population? Probably not, but I resent the fact that the government is at my kitchen table, infringing on my rights by telling me what I cannot eat plus making small credible farmers criminals. The sale of raw milk is currently illegal in Canada and why I referred to the current fight over food.

In The Untold Story of Milk, Ron Schmid, a Naturopathic physician and raw-milk advocate, writes that as city populations skyrocketed in the mid-1800s and pasture for cows in urban areas became scarce, dairies began feeding their cows waste grain from local distilleries. The cows quickly became diseased and emaciated, producing poor-quality milk that, coupled with inadequate sanitation and refrigeration, caused a host of health problems, mostly in young children, and created a scandal around the milk industry. Pasteurization was seen as a solution to what was known as the “milk problem.

A few weeks ago we finally bought shares in our very own cows! We searched for real milk in our area and thankfully found a farm nearby. Then we went to the farm to meet our new Jersey cows. Each week the milk from our cow is delivered on rotation by the members in the cow share program so we deliver about once every 8-9 weeks. Blossom and Daisey now provide us with delicious rich milk from which I can make butter, whey, yogurt and Kefir (recipes to follow). Pretty nice to have fresh milk delivered to our door! I have been lactose intolerant my whole life, probably another reason I chose to stay away all these years. Amazingly I have no lactose issues from our fresh milk or raw cheese (world class Gouda!).

I spoke recently with a former employee at a popular Canadian dairy. While they worked at the dairy, they never drank the  milk “because of the unsanitary conditions” they witnessed. Many conventional dairy farmers would say that milking a cow into a clean open bucket is unsanitary but this person brought up the point that conventional milk is milked into miles and miles of pipes. They often saw the caked interior of the tubing, the udders not being washed, and cows standing in piles of their own feces because they are hooked up all the time. I can’t think of anything more unsanitary. I can’t think of anything harder to clean than mile and miles of pipes! I’ll take a clean bucket and glass jar like my grandparents did.

Kelly the Kitchen Kop has written some great posts regarding raw/fresh milk for those of you who are interested. She is a seasoned traditional/real foods activist who I refer to often while we are getting used to eating the Weston Price way.

Raw Milk Benefits and Raw Milk Safety- Even if drinking raw milk is not for you, this is a good read to familiarize yourself with the industry of milk in general

Image credit: kthread

Tagged as: Activism, Raw milk, Real Food