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Is Raw Milk Worth It? The New Yorker's Dana Goodyear Seeks the Truth
In this week's issue of the New Yorker, Dana Goodyear covers the raw milk movement, beginning with the FDA raid on Rawesome Foods last year. In this accompanying online piece she interviews Dan Barber, the chef and co-owner of Blue Hill and Blue Hill Stone Barns, asking him his thoughts on raw milk vs. pasteurized milk. Although the importance of what the cow is eating beats out pasteurization for Barber, he's partial to raw milk in a larger context:
Watch the Making of Parmigiano Reggiano
Parmigiano Reggiano is often referred to as the king of cheeses, which, considering the wealth of staggeringly good cheese in the world, is quite the statement. Needless to say our interest was piqued when we found this video of how this venerable cheese comes into being. The best part is the calming music, rays of sunshine and general sense of well-being that emanates from this 3:32 minute video. It ends with the dramatic branding of the cheese, which is enough to get thee to a cheese shop to buy yourself a taste:
Click here to watch the video
Nurse By Day, Cheesemaker By Night
Debbie Mesler is a nurse in Vermont, but at night she comes home to her goats and makes chevre in her kitchen.
Mesler’s background and experience in science — chemistry, biology, precision, results — figure into her cheese making. But more important to the goat-to-table process is a kind of “gray” zone, apart from the right or wrong of evidence-based science, where earth and animals and taste and texture come together, Mesler suggests. It is this quality of cheese making that holds strong appeal and meaning for Mesler.
An Inside Look at One of China's Industrial Dairy Farms
Angela Yeoh of the Wall Street Journal takes us on a tour of one of China's industrial dairy farms, modeled after U.S. dairy farms. The farm has over 120,000 head of cattle:
Interview with "Cheese & Culture" Author Paul Kindstedt
Cheese & Culture: A History of Cheese and Its Place in Western Civilization came out last month. Melissa Pasanen of the Burlington Free Press interviewed author Paul Kindstedt, who's also a food science professor at UVM and the co-director of the Vermont Institute for Artisan Cheese, about the book.
From cheese’s ancient origins when it was first developed to enable almost universally lactose-intolerant adult humans to take advantage of dairy nutrition back around 6500 BC, Kinstedt painstakingly traces the story of cheese making, illuminating both large swathes and fascinating corners of global history along the way.
Cuban Sandwich War: Tampa vs. Miami
These two Floridian cities are in a battle over which one has the better Cuban sandwich. NPR's Miami and Tampa newsrooms have stepped in to make eloquent arguments for both sides. We suggest you read what each city has to say, and If you have an opinion go to NPR and vote for your favorite sandwich. Right now Tampa's in the lead:
Tampa's version includes salami, and it might have a swipe of mayo, depending on who's making it. Each city uses differently-shaped bread. Those are about the only substantive differences.
Now, most food historians agree the sandwich was invented in Tampa's Ybor City, but that's not the end of our story.
On Thursday, the Tampa City Council officially renamed the Cuban sandwich the "Historic Tampa Cuban Sandwich."
Thus, the gauntlet was thrown.
Read more about the smackdown here.
Six Frozen Cows Found in the Rockies
U.S. Park Rangers stumbled upon six dead, frozen cows in a remote cabin in the Rockies. The cows are presumably part of a herd of 29 that went missing in the mountains last fall. These poor cows, who most likely huddled in the cabin for shelter, have left the Park Service with the conundrum on their hands:
The cabin is at Conundrum Hot Springs at 11,200 feet, accessible only by a precipitous hike. And rangers are trying to figure out how to get rid of the carcasses before they decompose.
Powdered Milk - Not Fresh - Discovered in Inner Mongolian Milk Wine
An investigation into Inner Mongolia's specialty "milk wine" uncovered that four out of five bottles were illegally made using powdered milk, fragrance, and edible creams instead of fresh milk.
Under a 2009 standard, making milk wines requires blending liquor with fresh milk or whey before undergoing fermentation, the report said.
However, despite the difference in ingredients, fake milk wines taste similar to the genuine product, said Deng Zhao, an employee with an alcohol company in Chifeng City in Inner Mongolia.
Dairy Farming Isn't the 2nd Worst Job in the World After All
Dairy farming was recently ranked as the 199th worst job out of 200 in a CareerCast poll. Why? It's hard work! Being a newspaper reporter was ranked as 196, so Mike Gruss, a reporter for Hampton Roads, set out to learn more about a job that was supposedly worse than his own. In the end, he found out that dairy farming isn't so bad after all.
The first thing her own grandchildren do when they come to visit is run for the goats. In an era where self-sustainability is in vogue, Wright makes her own cheese, yogurt, milk and ice cream. The homemade ice cream has about twice as much butterfat, because of the goat milk, as store brands.
In India, Cows Are Out and Buffalo Are In
Over 55% of the milk that Indians consume is now coming from buffalo, instead of the Indian Holy Cow. Over the past 40 years, there's been a dramatic shift away from using cows to till and fertilize farmland. They're being replaced with buffalo (who produce more milk), diesel-powered farm equipment, and chemical fertilizers.
The most obvious reason for that is milk. An average Murrah buffalo produces 2,000-odd litres over a 300-day lactation period, which is more or less what comparable elite indigenous cattle breeds such as Sahiwal yield. But buffalo milk also fetches higher price, as it contains 7-7.5 per cent fat – almost twice that from cows.
