Bummed by raw milk shortage in Dallas? Check out real milk alternatives.

Real Milk from Texas Daily Harvest, Urban Acres, Dallas

August 2012 Update: Texas Daily Harvest has closed its creamery, much to my dismay. Lavon Farms still runs out of raw milk periodically, so get on their email list if you want availability updates. My current recommendation for low-temp pasturized milk is Mill-King, available at Patina Green and Urban Acres. See comments below the article for details.

 

I am a huge fan of real milk, preferably raw milk from grass-fed cows. The most convenient DFW source of raw milk, the Lucky Layla Farm Store at Lavon Farms in Plano, Texas, has been so popular that demand is sometimes greater than the supply.

If yours is one of the families disappointed when you’re unable to buy raw milk, I have an alternative for you: real milk from East Texas organic dairy, Texas Daily Harvest. It’s available locally at Urban Acres in Oak Cliff, at Whole Foods in Dallas and Plano, and through group and private delivery. They also have some good outlets around Austin, so Austinites check their website for locations. What makes Texas Daily Harvest milk “real milk?” It’s low-heat pasteurized and not homogenized, so it has the cream on top (shake it to mix before you pour).  Low-pasteurized means it’s heated to the minimum temperature required by law, so it still contains some good natural bacteria that you need for a healthy gut, as well as enzymes to help you digest the milk. If you happen to be out near Sulphur Springs, stop by Texas Daily Harvest and buy some raw milk from farmers, Ramy and Kent Jisha. I’ve toured their farm, and I am so impressed by these smart, conscientious farmers. I’m also thankful for them. Their passion and hard work keep good, real food on my table. Whether I buy their milk from Whole Foods or have it delivered (with free-range eggs and meat) to my house, I make sure I am well-stocked with my favorite real food. My husband and I drink a couple of gallons per week. If you can’t buy real milk, don’t bother drinking milk at all. Really. Ultra-Pasteurized milk from cows in confinement dairies, even if it’s organic, is not real food. For more info, check out my first post about real milk, and this one too. Be well! P.S. For my friends who prefer goat milk, or want to locate a raw cow milk dairy close to you, check out the Weston A. Price Foundation’s Real Milk site.

Breastfeeding Alternative: Homemade Formula

At the Wise Traditions conference last weekend I attended a session led by Sarah Pope, the Healthy Home Economist, about Breastfeeding Myths, Alternatives and Supplementation. This is an area in which I have no experience, not having been a Mom and all … but I have the utmost respect for Sarah and the wisdom shared by the Weston A. Price Foundation, so I happily attended. I hope this info helps you or someone you love.

The main points were:

1. breastfeed if you can
2. NEVER feed a commercial baby formula with soy, even if it’s organic
3. feed your baby one of the two homemade formulas in the video
4. even if you breastfeed well, you and your husband should practice making this in case something happens and you’re unable to breastfeed, or you need to supplement your breastmilk
5. this homemade formula is comparable in nutrition to mother’s milk
6. feed this formula until your baby is one year old, then switch to raw cow’s milk (cow’s milk has more vitamins than goat’s milk)

It was inspiring to see so many young moms at the session, and at the whole conference actually. This video gives step-by-step instruction to teach parents the optimal methods for homemade formula preparation.

Please read here for additional information. Be well.

Randy Travis Drinks Raw Milk

Last Sunday morning, my husband and I spent two happy hours with the Moore family at Lavon Farms in Plano, Texas, home of Lucky Layla drinkable yogurt. This is a picture of one of their beautiful Guernsey cows. We’ve been buying raw milk from the Moores since last summer when I first read Nina Planck‘s book, Real Food: What to Eat and Why?, and learned about the amazing nutrient-dense food that is raw milk.

We were out at the farm taking some pictures for a Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund fundraiser that will take place at Lavon Farms on November 11, during the Weston A. Price Foundation’s Wise Traditions Conference in Dallas. When details for both events become available, I’ll let you know.

Just 20 miles north of downtown Dallas, and a world away, this 200-acre farm is home to champion Guernsey and Jersey cows that live life the way cows were meant to. As we walked the pasture to get a better look a the cows, this Guernsey girl in the photo was so curious she just walked right up to us.

This great life they lead is in sharp contrast to the cows that produce most of the milk consumed in the U.S., even organic milk. Most milk is from confinement dairies where cows stand or lie on concrete, often in their own feces. At Lavon Farms, the average productive lifespan is seven to eight years; contrast that with industrial confinement dairy cows’ lifespan of two to three years.

Are you getting enough good protein in your diet? If you’re counting the protein in industrial pasteurized and homogenized milk, that might not count. Todd Moore reminded me that his milk contains the rare A2 protein that’s particularly beneficial for people with:

• type 1 diabetes
• high risk of heart disease
• autism

Only milk from Jersey and Guernsey cattle have the important A2 protein, and Guernseys are known to produce the highest percentage of A2 of all breeds of dairy cattle. If you or your family members have any of the above conditions, and even if you don’t, you may seriously want to consider drinking A2 raw milk. Find your local source for real milk here.

Ann Marie of Cheeseslave.com, says this about protein in general: “Protein is made up of chains of amino acids, which are the precursors for the neurotransmitters in our brain. The amino acids in protein are the building blocks of endorphins and serotinin. According to Julia Ross, pioneer in the field of nutritional psychology and author of The Mood Cure, lack of protein causes:

• • anxiety
  • depression
  • insomnia
  • ADD
  • alcohol/drug addiction, and a host of other problems

Julia says we need 20-30 grams of protein per meal — three times a day. And that’s just to maintain our current brain chemistry. Animal protein is the most nutrient-dense form of protein — so why not just cut to the chase? Anxious? Depressed? You need more protein! It’s essential to always eat fat with protein.”

I am so passionate about real, raw milk that it inspired me to start this blog. My first blog post was about raw milk, and my masthead features bottles of fresh milk. My husband and I drink about a gallon a week; we’ve been known to drink two … and we find ourselves white-knuckling it toward the end of the week, trying to make it last until our next visit to Lavon Farms. I drink it before and after my Camp Gladiator bootcamp workout. Raw milk is the perfect food: you get protein, carbs and good fat, as well as tons of vitamins for healthy body and amino acids for a healthy gut. When your milk is from healthy, happy cows, milked under sanitary conditions, and it’s not pasteurized or homogenized, you get the full benefits of nature’s perfect food.

So what about Randy Travis? I hear he’s a fan of raw milk from Lavon Farms, too!

Simple Real Food Recipe: Broccoli Cheddar Soup

Serendipity struck in the kitchen last night: I made a delicious broccoli cheddar soup on the fly, and it was terrific! You’ll see from the picture on the left, that it’s bright green, not orangey-yellow. When you mix green broccoli with naturally white cheese, you get a beautiful bright green soup.

Mainstream cheddar is orange only because industrial food companies dye it that way. I had a lightbulb moment about this last weekend when I visited some cheese artisans at the Texas Daily Harvest farm in east Texas. I must tell you, this was a revelation to me.

My broccoli cheddar soup was serendipitous because I was making another dish, and ended up with mushy broccoli that I couldn’t use. I had meant to blanch my broccoli, and then put it in an ice bath, but I ended up letting it boil too long. This turned out to be a great thing, because it turned into a delicious, easy soup. I hope you like it.

Ingredients

• 2 c. raw whole milk (Texas Daily Harvest)
• 4 c. broccoli (boil five minutes in salted water; put in an ice bath to stop cooking and retain bright green color; drain)
• 3/4 c. chicken broth (Pacific Organic Free Range)
• 8 oz. shredded cheddar (Kerrygold Reserve Cheddar)
• sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

I blended it for five minutes on high in my Vitamix blender*, and it came out velvety smooth and piping hot. Drizzle good quality extra virgin olive oil (Tutta Toscana) over the top, and enjoy! You may also want to experiment by adding a dollop of creme fraiche or sour cream, and maybe some toasted pine nuts. Buon appetito!

*If you don’t have a high-performance blender such as Vitamix or Blendtec, you’ll need to heat it on the stove. (Blend the broccoli with the liquid ingredients, pour it in the pot, add the shredded cheese, and heat.) I love the Vitamix; it makes hot soups, smoothies, and so much more; I use it almost every day. It has an air-cooled motor that allows it to run for long periods of time without overheating.

Raw milk!

Until five weeks ago raw milk had never passed my lips, nor had it ever crossed my mind. Thanks to Nina Planck’s book Real Food: What to Eat and Why, it’s now a regular part of my daily diet, and I can’t imagine life without it. Raw milk is creamy, sweet, fresh, fat and an honest-to-goodness real whole food.

Besides the great taste, there are many nutritional benefits to drinking raw milk, including vitamins and more available calcium that are damaged if pasteurized. Milk is a whole food, complete with protein, fat and carbohydrates. What about people who say they are lactose intolerant? They can drink raw milk because it contains the lactase enzyme that’s necessary to digest the lactose (lactase is killed when pasteurized). Here’s Real Food author Nina Planck on dairy and eggs. Here’s Sally Fallon on real raw milk.

In some states it’s actually illegal to buy and sell raw milk. Really. You can buy cigarettes and all kinds of toxic substances masquerading as food, but not wholesome raw milk. That’s not the case in Texas; you just have to buy it from the farm. The weekly 40-mile round-trip trek to the Lucky Layla Farm Store at  Lavon Farms in Plano, where they sell milk from pastured champion Guernsey and Jersey cows, is a small price to pay.

Want to learn more about raw milk, including where you can get it? Visit A Campaign for Real Milk, a project of the Weston A. Price Foundation.