Raw

Well, our little family has just embarked upon a new and unexpected little journey...we former "city mice" have decided to go a little less urbane with our diet and have started drinking raw milk.

Raw milk, for the uninitiated is simply milk fresh from the cow. It is not pasteurized (cooked) as typical, store-bought milk is, nor is it homogenized. This means that the cream will separate out. It means that our whole milk is *truly* whole.

On average, our family of four drinks about 6-8 gallons of milk a week. (What can I say, the kids and the husband are milk drinkers...) At current local prices nearing $4/gallon, that is a healthy chunk of the grocery bill. This past Sunday, after church, we went to a small local diner with some friends. In typical diner fashion, the placemats had little ads all around the border. One of the ads was for raw milk, $2.50/gallon. This prompted a lengthy discussion, and the decision to venture out and try it.

So Monday afternoon I drove out to the dairy farm, picked up a gallon and we gave it a test run. It certainly has a slightly different flavor, but the kids and the hubby have decided that they like it.

There appear to be many potential health benefits to drinking raw milk, and it is certainly less costly, so we'll just have to see how this works out over the next several weeks.