A recent article at The Daily shows a video of an Amish farmer trafficking contraband from his farm in Pennsylvania to a busy street in Manhattan. The article goes on the explain that,
“he wasn’t selling them anything they planned to smoke, snort or inject. Rather, he was giving them their once-a-month fix of raw milk — an unpasteurized product banned outright in 12 states and denounced by the FDA as a public health hazard, but beloved by a small but growing number of devotees who tout both its health benefits and its flavor.”
“Unpasteurized milk is increasingly popular among foodies and health nuts for both its taste and its supposed nutritional benefits. But government authorities take a hard line, warning that unpasteurized milk may contain salmonella, E. coli and bacteria that can lead to typhoid fever and tuberculosis.”
According to the FDA,
“Raw milk is inherently dangerous and it should not be consumed by anyone at any time for any purpose”
In 2008 a police raid was commenced on the Manna Storehouse, a Mennonite-run co-op in Lorain County, Ohio. According to reports, the family was held at gunpoint while agents searched the premises for unpasteurized dairy products. Yet, as all wars on supply reveal, the price adjusts and a black market thrives.
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maybe the story is fake.
This appears real, except for the agents raiding the facility – that seemed to be taken from somewhere else. In most states, selling raw milk is legal.
It’s not fake. I’ve seen articles like this before. People form loose coops with one another so they can traffic in raw foods with one another. Sometimes they get investigated and sometimes closed down.
It is also becoming increasingly difficult to do things like produce gourmet and traditional cheeses as the bacteria content can be high and the production equipment and techniques required to produce unique cheese have little chance to meet government standards. We also have people smuggling in toilets from Canada because it is illegal to manufacture them in the USA.
Pretty soon you’ll have to use informal channels to purchase your incandescent light bulbs, too, as they are going to become illegal to sell on retail shelves.
Just little losses of freedom here and there.
Sadly, this article will probably lead to a crackdown on the market, driving it only further underground.
Odd that the consumers are often bankers, lawyers, and other members of the New York elite that work so hard to maintain the current order, yeah?
I dont know about milk, but pastorized apple cider is just gross, something about the rapid heating and cooling ruines the taste of the stuff.
I used to buy ‘raw’ cider from Amish farms every year, until I found a local farm that uses low levels of radition to kill bacteria in their cider without effecting the taste. I wonder why this sort of radiation treatment isnt more common….Is it prohibitively expensive?(somehow I doubt it) Is there too much fear of radiation leftover from the Cold War and silver-age comics? Or is the government cracking down on it as well?
You need a load of cobalt 60 for that. That’s certainly not something that you can get over the counter or manage safely. You would have to subcontract with an “irradiator” –> http://www.fipa.us/
I think there is still some doubt about whether ionized proteins in the product are a problem or not. Probably not.
The radiation treatment would destroy some of the supposedly-healthful molecules, not as much as pasteurization. There probably are some strange fears about ionized proteins.
“Bureaucrats Gone Wild”
In Hollywood, the latest fad is cafe au lait made with human breast milk. I wonder how long it is going to be before some omniscient bureaucrat decides that this milk is unpasteurized and that it needs to be regulated? Or that mothers breast feeding babies poses a health hazard and needs to be regulated?
They’ll just impose a boob tax
According to basic political-economic principle, you tax what you want less of, and subsidize what you want more of. Does this mean the FDA wants less boobs? What madness is this?
You must be joking? Woody Allen’s influence is still big over there as I see.
Walt thanks for keeping us abreast of the latest trends.
This actually happens surprisingly often. It won’t be very long before people aren’t allowed to own a goat or a cow legally unless they submit to inspections and play ball with the very influential dairy lobby. Some suggested reading that I’ve found useful: The Farm Fiasco by James Bovard, and Amish Society by John Hostetler.
I do find it interesting that trade is the actual enemy of the state here. These are all based on regulations that the dairy lobby insists upon, of course, to crush small producers and keep prices as high as possible. “The people,” in the name of health, are not asking to be protected in any way by government. In fact, they’re seeking the raw milk out for health reasons. There’s something quite wrong when the most peaceful and productive members of American society are outlaws and must be searched at gunpoint.
I’ve had raw milk in California where last I checked it was legal to sell it in stores, but most stores don’t for fear of liability. My experience was great. It was delicious! and according to its proponents it’s very nutritious and if from a good supplier really no more of a risk than anything else people eat or drink. The numbers I’ve seen support that.
Contrast that to Oregon where it’s legal, but illegal to sell in stores. You have to go directly to the dairy farm but the farm cannot advertise it, then on your first visit you have to listen to the farmers explain the risks and sign off on some paperwork. To figure out who these dairy farmers are you have to rely on word-of-mouth and be willing to drive for awhile.
I’m currently drinking a non-homogenized milk that is pasteurized to the minimum required by state law for store bought milk. It’s fantastic, the kind of milk where the cream rises to the top and I’ve never had any problems with it. Taken with an overall good diet my health has improved tremendously over the last year or two and I’ve lost weight. My cholesterol has improved too, probably about as good as it gets.
Looks like you might need to check again. Google Rawesome Foods (coverage on RT).
Knew it was too good to be true.
It’s fine to say you prefer it one way, but when you start promoting a single product as a wonder food that fixes a wide variety of problems, you tend to destroy the image of what you’re trying to promote. Just tell people it’s as good as supermarket milk and tastes better. When you start trying to justify the product by driving a laundry list of health improvements, you end up coming off as a nutjob and will alienate people. I know you believe it, but all of the claims are unsupported (anecdotal stories are not evidence) and people are so used to seeing BS in forms of e-mail spam and television commercials they’ll just end up assuming raw milk is bad because you calim it’s so good.
Simplicity is your friend. And be sure you are also honest about the risks when promoting the product. There are health risks to unpasteurized milk, that’s why pasteurization was developed in the first place. It’s never believable for any product to not have a downside. Everything has a downside, no matter how beneficial it may be.
Exactly – you should simply be able to purchase and consume raw milk. End of statement.
I wonder if the Amish and Mennonites will get into a turf war.
LOL government prohibition leads to turf wars among the black marketeers.
But to be precise, Amish are Mennonites. Maybe they could start something with the Amana colonies?
Amish and Mennonites are separate, I thought…… Mennonites will utilize most modern technology, while Amish will not……….
The Amish are, strictly speaking, the extreme conservitive wing of the Mennonities.
Raw milk is great for natural bodybuilders and even many of those who are lactose “intolerant.” The enzymes in the milk (which are destroyed by pasteurization) help your body digest the milk itself. It saves your body the trouble of having to produce those enzymes itself. The end result is that it’s much easier to digest and eating is much more anabolic as a result (your body isn’t wasting resources producing enzymes, resources which could go into building more muscle).
AJ,
There is no lactase in raw milk…
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=349312
It is certainly tasty though.
While I fully believe that anyone should be able to buy and/or sell raw milk, and it probably has excellent taste properties, etc., the health benefits are overblown. Most of the limited research is from the 30′s and 40′s (I’ve looked into it). Not to say that there may not be some health benefits (especially for certain individuals with some diseases, etc.), but don’t get carried away with that part of it.
“Raw milk is inherently dangerous and it should not be consumed by anyone at any time for any purpose”
“Inherently dangerous?” Any dairy farmer drinks his own milk, which by definition is unpasteurized. Pasteurization merely extends the shelf life of nature’s richest food. The FDA is off the reservation.
Uh,
Mankind has been drinking cow’s milk for how many millenia???
Whatever the health benefits, we have a God-Given right to drink whatever the Hell we want!!!
Give me a break, people. This should NOT be controversial on a “libertarian” web site!!
Drink Up!!!
To me pasteurization is a wonderful thing. It’s a wonderful technological advance that saved countless people’s lives. Not only by preventing food born illnesses, but by extending the lifespan of edible foods, and in combination of other technologies, made food much more affordable.
No longer were you required to immediately consume all foods. You could cook many types, can it, and then re use it months or even years later. Fantastic stuff.
Of course it took them a few tries before they got it right….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin's_lost_expedition
But if people want raw foods for whatever reason. I don’t see why it’s anybody else’s business.
All correct, but pasteurization was introduced when conditions on dairy farms were much dirtier than they are now. But, the same pasteurization is still used.
Pasteurisation alters the taste of milk. Try drinking a glass of pasteurised and then a glass of unpasteurised and you’ll see what I mean. There is a big difference.
I suspect the difference between the two may be even more noticable in the USA than elsewhere. When I was last in the USA, a year back, I noticed US dairy product tasted oddly bland- perhaps all the taste had been processed out! And as far as coffee is concerned….best not mentioned as there is none in the USA, none at all!
Sione
You can find good stuff here, you just have to ask around and look. Stay away from mainstream US coffee brands, that is correct!!!!!
Dave
Fair enough. I did find Kona from Hawaii to be enjoyable and one of my hosts had some good coffee at her place. I don’t know where she got it but knowing her it likely it wasn’t a mainstream brand.
Why, in general, is the coffee on mainland USA so terrible? I’d have thought that North Americans would have wanted to enjoy a high-quality taste experience. What gives?
Sione
I will tell you the difference of raw milk cheese just looking at it. My friend Ed who lives in the US says he had a dog sniffing his creamy cheese on the airplane line coming back from France, as it was hidden in the hand luggage. The US dog-officer asked him “what’s that?” (probably pointing his gun). -”It’s cheese”. “- Oh, all right. … but, say, it’s not some kind of raw milk cheese right?”. Ed: – “It’s cheese…”. – “Ok go ahead then, said the officer”.
They do import Roquefort (raw milk of course) in the US though:
http://greatest-blog.com/george-bushs-legacy-the-roquefort-tax-1409/
“Black Market?”
This blog has been referred to the Department of Political Corrections!
Capt. Mike and Dave Albin:
The problem with unpasteurized milk is a bit more complicated than simply a matter of consumer protection.
The problem is that milk is a potential major vector for the transmission of tuberculosis. And, if significant numbers of people are being infected with the tubercle bacillus from the milk they drink and contracting the disease, they, then, become spreaders of the disease themselves, particularly in their sputum, sneezes, etc. Such epidemiology has always–except among the most fervent and uncomromisingly fanatic proponents of personal liberty–been cause for excercise of the police power (similarly to such measures as quarantine, etc.).
People who wish to consume raw milk may still do so in most places–legally, though, perhaps, more expensively; it just entails that dairymen wishing to market such product submit their cows to a more frequent test for the infection than required of those whose milk will be subsequently pasteurized. It’s difficult for those of us living in “modern times” to appreciate what a threat to health and life such disease was a mere 100 years ago.
Of course your point is taken. However, all the more reason for the “market” (consumers) to prefer those purveyors whose sanitation efforts are superior, e.g. the Amish. The clean shall prosper.
It has been said that pasteurization is a lazy man’s fix for filthy barns and cows.
Exactly……………….
Human tuberculosis is not the same thing as bovine tuberculosis. Yes bovine tuberculosis can infect humans and other animals. And yes it can be transmitted through raw dairy products.
But it’s not communicable like human variant is. Your not going to get infected by being in the same room as a infected person, like you can with human variant. It’s possible, but rare. This is my understanding. Not a doctor or anything. Adults are going to be resistant against it. Children have higher risk of infection, however.
Personally I think that pasteurization is a godsend. It’s stupid not to take advantage of simple technologies like that for food safety.
That being said; doing raids on these people for trading and selling raw foods is like the government doing raids on Japanese restaurants for serving under-cooked meat and fish. Yeah sure raw fish is stupid. Sure it’s flash frozen or whatever, but I still don’t trust it. (I’ve tasted it, and it is tasty. But it’s not that tasty. Especially for the prices that decent sushi costs. )
Like any raw food there is significant dangers that you don’t get from cooked food. It’s just a matter of properly handling it. Raw fruits and vegetables in many places is far more deadly… Improperly handled water kills millions and millions of people every year. But it’s not like it’s justifiable to have the government raid people’s houses that use private wells.
GENE BERMAN, the way I look at it, I don’t need to be protected from anything or anyone by the State. State “security,” that is to say, responsibility for my welfare, always comes at a price that I wont voluntarily pay, for, IMHO it inevitably costs more than it is worth when all costs, including the lost-opportunities costs, are included. I think when you credit government with, for example, preventing or eliminating disease, you may be relying on information (propaganda) disseminated primarily by statists and hearing half of the story–the half the State wants you to hear. I don’t think I am a fanatic, but do try not to compromise on freedom, which I equate with compromising on my ethics and the principles by which I seek to live. Another of those principles is nonviolence. Since everything the State does is predicated upon its “authority” to initiate the use of force against entirely inoffensive individuals, I would be violating that principle if I willingly used the State and its agents–my agents–to attain or accomplish anything.
Anyone doubting that agents of the US Department of Agriculture do not behaves like thugs while enforcing regulations to save us from ourselves against farmers engaged in harmless farming activities should read the book, MAD SHEEP, by Linda Faillace. (Google it to get lots of info on the book, the incident/event involving USDA thugs, a Youtube video. and more.) It could change your thinking. On the video you’ll also learn about your government’s NAIS (National Animal Identification System) regulations from someone who is not an anarchist–but who has been made ripe for conversion by the USDA.
DANGER. MAD COW DISEASE IS STALKING THE NATION’S FARMS. FARMERS DON’T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT YOU. IN THEIR GREEDY QUEST FOR PROFITS, THEY WILL LET YOU DIE A HORRIBLE DEATH. ONLY UNCLE SAM CARES ENOUGH TO SAVE YOU FROM MAD COWS. YOU NEED THE STATE TO SAVE YOU AND YOUR FAMILY FROM AN EPIDEMIC. ONLY NAIS CAN PREVENT AN OUTBREAK. Sincerely, Tom Vilsack, Secretary, USDA
My experience with milk: It was not a part of my diet for many decades because all that was available to me was the tasteless stuff in the grocery stores. Then for ten years we owned and milked a few Toggenburg dairy goats and drank their raw milk. It was usually quite good, but occasionally had a bad taste when the goats got into wild onions or other pungent weeds. Two years ago I was able to buy raw cows’ milk, by which I mean unpasturized and nonhomoginized fresh milk, from a farmer who milked two cows and labeled it “pet milk” to avoid the state’s prohibition against selling raw milk for human consumpton. I was paying $10 a gallon, not in NYC, but East Tennessee, no less. Expensive, but delicious and worth it to me until I got one bad tasting gallon as a result of mastitis in one of his two cows. Having milked goats, I could understand how this could happen but it made me question his quality control. He obviously hadn’t tasted his milk before selling it. Subsequently I found even better tasting milk for considerable less ($6.50/g) in the local Whole Foods store. It is from a relatively small, family-owned and operated dairy near Knoxville. The reason it is so good is four fold: 1. It is low-temp pasturized as opposed to high-temp or flash pasturization, which all large dairies use nowadays. 2. It is not homoginzed, which is important for flavor in my experience and may have health benefits. 3. It is from Jersey cows. These beautiful animals have a much higher butterfat content than the Holstein cattle most farmers milk today for their higher milk production. Butterfat is what makes milk taste good. 4. It is not labeled “organic,” but unquestionable the farmers in this case practice organic-farming techniques. This is my second experience with a small dairy selling low-temp pasturized, non-homoginzed Jersey milk. In both cases they delivered consistently exquisite flavor. The other such dairy was (is) in Wooster, Ohio.
I owned and operated a cider mill for a decade in the 1970s before the state mandated pasturization. I was the first cider mill in Ohio to sell fresh, unpasturized cider to grocery stores. Unpasturized cider is going to turn to hard cider in due course, therefore many grocers wouldn’t handle it because they had experienced it beginning to turn hard before or soon after their customers bought it. I overcame that problem by taking these steps, 1. Quality control of the apples: no rot–period! If you wouldn’t eat it, I wouldn’t have it in my cider. 2. Relentless attention to cleanliness and sanitation. 3. Temperature control from pressing the apples to delivering it into the customers’ hands. (I had to ensure that my wholesale distributor and retail-store customers kept it cold and rotated their stock. The shelf live of cider varies inversely with its temperature; the colder it is kept the longer it remains fresh of taste. At 33 degrees it will stay fresh for 2-3 weeks; at 70 degrees, less than two days. I filtered my cider, which made it much more attractive looking, a magnificent amber gold when packaged in glass, and likely added a little to its shelf life. I also circulated my cider through an ultra-violet water purifier. Due to cider’s opacity, this system, which kills all pathogens in water with one pass, cannot accomplish such perfection in cider but it certainly helps and does not alter the flavor at all.
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Here’s the latest.
http://www.infowars.com/raw-food-raid-armed-agents-bust-raw-milk-cheese-selle
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