Info & Links

 

   
Home

About Your Cows

Membership

Info & Links

More in MI

Contact Us

Recipes  |  Websites  |  Book Suggestions  |  Discussion Groups

Visit us at the 2008 SW Michigan Harvest Festival!

MMM will have a table at this year’s annual 2008 SW Michigan Harvest Fest!  The event is hosted by Tillers International in Scotts, Michigan, just west of Portage, and will be held on Saturday, September 21st from 11:30 am to 6:30 pm. There will be many local exhibitors, growers and vendors, yummy food from local restaurants, music and dancing, and activities for the kids, too.  Cost is just $10 per carload!

Visit the Harvest Fest website at www.fairfoodmatters.org/harvestfest for more information and a map to the event. We hope to see you there!

Recipes
We've searched online for things you can do with your raw milk, and have our own suggestions as well.  If you have any to add, please email us and we'll add your link.  Some great books for raw milk recipes are Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon and Wild Fermentation by Sandor Elixor Katz.  

Fresh yogurt -- Seven Stars plain whole milk yogurt makes a great starter, and you can even freeze it in ice cube trays, store in a mason jar, and defrost one when you need a new starter.  Heat milk to 110 degrees to keep it "alive", as in this raw milk yogurt recipe, or heat to 180 degrees and cool to 110 degrees for thicker, creamier yogurt, as in the yogurt recipe in our February newsletter.

Butter -- This is very easy to do!  Let milk sit overnight so cream can settle to the top, suck off cream with a turkey baster, or pour milk into an iced tea container with spigot, let sit over night, then pour off the milk from the bottom back into the original container and the cream will be left.  Let the cream stand out until it's room temp.  Put in your blender and blend for a minute or two, or until you see that the butterfat has separated.  Or you can use the shaker method (scroll down to #3).  Strain out the butter, then continue to rinse and press in cold water until the water runs clear.  Salt if you want, and enjoy!  You can also make unsalted butter into ghee if you like Indian dishes.

Cottage Cheese, Cultured Buttermilk, and Sour Cream are some yummy thing you can make with cultured raw milk.   

Our past newsletters also contain one recipe per month, like butter, yogurt, buttermilk, crème fraiche, feta cheese, etc.


Websites

Real Milk:  A Campaign for Real Milk!

Raw Milk:  The Right to Choose Healthy Food, a not-for-profit organization for education.

The Milk Diet, based on ideas of Charles Sanford Porter and Bernarr Macfadden.  On this site you can read about the basics of the milk diet. You can also learn about the diet's classic works and read and download Porter's The Milk Diet and Macfadden’s The Miracle of Milk, free to readers interested in the milk diet.  What kind of milk should be used?  Raw, of course!

Raw Milk Facts:  One individual has put together raw milk information, sites, book suggestions, and more in one website.

"Is Soda Pop or Milk Healthier?"  An in-depth article on a personal site called "Perspicacious Eye:  Pursuing the reality of environmental and natural health issues".  The author touches on many of the issues which are addressed at length in the book, The Untold Story of Milk.

MI Fresh Milk Council:  is a partnership focused on promoting direct farmer to consumer relationships for providing fresh unprocessed milk and dairy products.  They don't have a website yet, but you can join the MFMC as a cow share shareholder/consumer or supporter/donor to support their efforts in Michigan.  Read more about them and download their membership application.

Websites talking about possible risks of drinking fresh milk:

Michigan State:  "What's the Scoop on Raw Milk in Michigan?"

USFDA:  Food Safety and Raw Milk

Time article:  "Got Raw Milk?  Be Very Quiet"

Other healthy and/or local food groups & organizations:

Weston A. Price Foundation:  Promoting wise traditions in food, farming and the healing arts.

Local Harvest:  Real food, real farmers, real community: find local sources in your area for vegetables, meats and other produce.

Eat Wild:  Find sources for safe, healthy, natural and nutritious grass-fed beef, lamb, goats, bison, poultry, pork and dairy products.

Sustainable Table celebrates the sustainable food movement, educates consumers on food-related issues and works to build community through food.  

Locavore NationThis is a project sponsored by NPR's Splendid Table.  Locavore Nation is a year-long effort to see what it takes to live by a regionally based diet.  One of our members was chosen as one of 15 individuals across the nation to participate and blog about their experiences with this project!  You can read about all their experiences and post your own comments as well.

The Farm To Consumer Legal Defense Fund: Provides affordable legal counsel to farmers and consumers in need, it will make the needs of the small farmer and the concerned consumer known to our government, and it will promote their shared vision: Sustainable farming and direct farm-to-consumer transactions.  Mi Milk Maidens is a member of this organization.

Book Suggestions
If you are interested in reading more about real milk and other traditional foods, here are some books you might want to check out from your local library or request through your local independent bookstore.


Read chapter 15 of this book online, titled "The Safety of Raw vs. Pasteurized Milk"

The Untold Story of Milk: Green Pastures, Contented Cows and Raw Dairy Foods
by Ron Schmid, ND

...The role of milk in the rise of civilization and in early America, the distillery dairies, compulsory pasteurization and the politics of milk, traditional dairying cultures – the chapters on these subjects will change forever the way you think about milk...This book will serve as a catalyst for that movement – a movement that could change the life of every individual who comes to fully understand the value of raw milk from healthy, grassfed animals.   — SALLY FALLON, author of Nourishing Traditions and President of the Weston A. Price Foundation

This book can be purchased online from the publisher, New Trends Publishing, for $19.95 plus shipping.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Raw Truth About Milk
(formerly The Milk Book)
by William Campbell Douglass

If you knew what we know about milk...BLEEECHT! All that pasteurization, homogenization and processing is not only cooking all the nutrients right out of your favorite drink. It's also adding toxic levels of vitamin D. This fascinating book tells the whole story about milk. How it once was nature's nearly perfect food...How "raw," unprocessed milk can heal and boost your immune system ~ why you can't buy it legally in this country anymore, and what we could do to change that.

This book can be purchased from Douglas' website at http://rawtruthaboutmilk.com.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

This book can be purchased online from the publisher, New Trends Publishing, for $25.00 plus shipping.

Nourishing Traditions:  The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats
by Sally Fallon

This well-researched, thought-provoking guide to traditional foods contains a startling message: Animal fats and cholesterol are not villains but vital factors in the diet, necessary for normal growth, proper function of the brain and nervous system, protection from disease and optimum energy levels. Sally Fallon dispels the myths of the current low-fat fad in this practical, entertaining guide to a can-do diet that is both nutritious and delicious.  Includes a section about raw milk, and includes recipes for yoghurt, crème fraiche, kefir, buttermilk and cream cheese, among many others.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Wild Fermentation:  The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-culture Foods
by Sandor Ellix Katz

"Fermentation has been an important journey of discovery for me," writes author Sandor Ellix Katz. "I invite you to join me along this effervescent path, well trodden for thousands of years yet largely forgotten in our time and place, bypassed by the superhighway of industrial food production."  Includes a chapter on dairy ferments, including yoghurt, kefir, buttermilk and farmer cheese.


Yahoo Discussion Groups

Join one of these yahoo discussion groups--some are local to SW Michigan, some are state-wide, and some are national.

Michigan Real Milk Rights:  This site is being established to coordinate all supporters of raw milk in Michigan.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/michiganrealmilkrights/

Raw Dairy:  Lots of information from both farmers and consumers from all over the world, including recipes, lists of books and online literature, scientific studies, and discussion about current events and legalities pertaining to raw dairy.
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/RawDairy/

Eat Local SW Michigan:  virtual meeting place for people in southwest Michigan to northern Indiana to find sources of local foods, and to share stories and adventures about how eating locally can change your life and health, and that of your community.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EatLocalSWMich/

Natural Families of Kalamazoo:  Local group that strives to provide resources, education, support and camaraderie for parents who wish to make conscious, compassionate, and informed choices for themselves and their families.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NFKalamazoo/

Home  |  Membership  |  About Your Cows  |  Info & Links  |  More in MI  |  Contact Us