Living Locally: Milk and Homemade Cheese
Where to buy local milk and how to enjoy it-coming right up.
Photos
"Oh, milkman, milkman," she says, "You can come and live at my house anytime!"
As a child, I was always curious about that line from The Patchwork Cat, and intrigued by the illustration of a sleek tabby winding herself around uniformed pant legs and glass bottles on a doorstep. Several decades later, I love local food for many of the same reasons: in addition to simpler, more sustainable production and superior taste, it provides a more aesthetically pleasing experience -- one worthy of a color leaf in a children's book.
Happily, there are all kinds of sources for local milk in central Maryland. In addition to local chains like Roots, MOM and Atwater's, all of which stock milk from small producers, interested locavores can purchase directly from South Mountain Creamery, which delivers to homes for a nominal fee. Many of these dairies bottle in glass, which looks prettier on the breakfast table and leaves a much smaller carbon footprint, since it can be refilled a nearly infinite number of times.
Once you have your milk, here are some great recipes for showing it off:
- Flan. This delicious Latin dessert is also a wonderful breakfast: eggs, milk and just enough sweetness to keep things interesting. The recipe I use is very simple. First, the caramel: boil 2/3 cup sugar and 1/3 cup water over medium heat until it turns a light brown color. Pour into a clear glass pie pan, swirling to coat the edges. Meanwhile, put some water on to boil and heat 3 cups milk with a cinnamon stick and the zest of one orange (grate it finely using that zester I told you about) Beat 4 eggs with 1/3 cup sugar and slowly pour in hot milk, whisking constantly. Pour on top of caramel and place inside another, larger pan; pour boiling water into larger pan until it reaches halfway up the sides of the flan dish. Bake until center is just a little jiggly, about 45 minutes at 350. Carefully remove from oven and cool, then invert on a plate. Yum!
- Mozzarella cheese. Are you shocked? Ever since discovering Ricki Carroll's incredible resources online and in print, I've loved surprising my friends and family with this cheese. Her recipe is so straightforward I won't duplicate it here, but I will tell you that I don't use the microwave -- I heat a pan of water to almost-boiling and dunk the cheese ball in a colander, in and out of the water until it's soft enough to knead.
- Ricotta cheese. If you've made mozzarella, all you have to do is ricotta (reboil) the leftover liquid until it separates into tiny, fluffy curds and clear whey, then strain it through a cheesecloth-lined sieve. If you want more volume, simply heat a gallon of milk to 180 degrees, stir in 1/4 cup vinegar or lemon juice, and let it sit until curds have formed, about 10 minutes.
- Hot cocoa. We haven't had many cocoa-worthy days this winter, but here's hoping, since cocoa made from milk is one of life's most beautiful pleasures. Start with two cups of milk; whisk in a few tablespoons of Dutch-process cocoa powder, which blends more easily. Add a splash of vanilla, a pinch of salt to bring out the flavor, and sweeten to taste with sugar or honey. I like to make my cocoa Mexican by adding a generous pinch of cinnamon and a dash of cayenne pepper; you could also add almond extract, orange zest or freshly-ground nutmeg.
- Greek yogurt. Making your own yogurt is also remarkably simple: Heat the milk, but not so hot you can't stick a finger in it; cool briefly and stir in a couple of spoonfuls of plain store-bought yogurt. Allow it to sit at warm room temperature (in a preheated oven that has been turned off, for instance) for about twelve hours; strain until it reaches your desired thickness and density, as you would for ricotta. Once you start making both regularly (and you will!) you'll probably want a strainer, which reliably produces thick, creamy results. I haven't fully tested this theory, but I'm pretty sure anything goes well on Greek yogurt: jam, honey, fruit, nuts, seeds and maybe even broccoli. Well, almost anything.
Frank Hazzard
8:04 am on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
People often speak of sustainability in terms of a three-legged stool, with the legs being "planet" (environment), "people," and "profit" (economics). If any of the legs is missing, the stool topples. The "buy" and "eat" local movements are a great example of consumers' ability to reinforce all three legs. Farmers get retail prices for their products, which substantially improves their economic situation and their families' lives. And the environment benefits because less fuel is required to ship food to the point of consumption. Although these concepts seem elementary to some, they remain novel to most Americans.
H.R. Pufnstuf
8:31 am on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Frank, how do you know that less fuel is used? I get my milk and dairy from South Mountain Creamery. They deliver it in a truck one day a week, which they drive from their farm in Middletown. It's not obvious to me that there's a fuel savings. It probably uses less fuel to have a tractor trailer show up the farm to collect the milk, ship it to a bottling plant and then distribute it to grocery stores. That would explain why grocery stores are cheaper. I don't think you're considering all of the variables.
Chelsea Willis
9:30 am on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
South mountain creamery has wonderful products but unfortunately for me they are all cow products. I have been looking for a good place to buy Goat's milk and cheese.
Frank Hazzard
9:31 am on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Great point! I don't know for sure. It depends on how far things are shipped. some milk sold in Howard County comes from New York state. Milk that is produced in Maryland probably saves fuel no matter how it gets to your cereal bowl. Food that is delivered to homes might not save fuel until the density of customers is high enough to make efficient use of a delivery vehicle. However, when we can drive a reasonable distance to the source of our food (farms), buy it there and take it home, we are probably saving some fuel. And we could save twice as much if we were to take a neighbor with us. One implication of being a locavore is that you have to accept eating what's in season. If you want strawberries 12 months per year, you have to accept that they will be trucked 2,500 miles from California to your local grocery store except for a 45-day period in late spring of each year. Overall, I think locally grown food is more environmentally friendly, but it's very difficult to calculate exact impacts and know for sure.
H.R. Pufnstuf
9:46 am on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
We don't know for sure but the numbers suggest that more fuel is used with the locally grown option. In addition to paying more for the milk, I also pay a delivery charge to SMC. Additonally, there is at least one milk producer in Howard County so your claim that milk sold in HoCo comes from NY is far from the whole story. The Patrick family has had a dairy farm here for years. They actually have two dairy farms in HoCo now. I don't know specifically where their milk is bottled or sold but it's probably not in NY.
TomP
10:20 am on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
I'm pretty certain that the Maple Dell Farm milk produced at the Patrick family farm as well as any other local dairy milk is picked up at the farm and shipped to the Cooperative Milk Producers plant still in Howard county on Leishear Road north of Laurel. There is also some really excellent cheese produced by another long established Howard County dairy family, the Jones in Sykesville. Real locavore source Larriland Farm carries their cheese when they open in the spring.
H.R. Pufnstuf
11:30 am on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
That makes sense. I think the fallacy in thinking of many "green" advocates is that they assume everything in the grocery store has traveled halfway acros the country to get there. I'll bet that milk at the average HoCo grocery store has less fuel per gallon used to produce it than SMC milk.
K Q Bankert
12:08 pm on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Shopping locally is the important thing. SMC is a great place to take the kids for the fall festival, see the calves being born and cows milked. The pumpkin ice cream is something else. I'm lactose intolerant so it's small quantities for me. Allan loves their 2%--it may have a little cream at the top, not the blue dish water from the grocery store.. I have tasted some of their other products--free range turkeys, cheeses, yogurts. Excellent quality. And home delivery--what more can you ask for?.
Chelsea Willis
2:35 pm on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Cow's milk is processed in a way that does not agree with people. Goat's milk is much more readily acceptable to human stomachs because it does not need the same processing as cow's milk. A lot of lactose intolerant people really are not. It is the processing that bothers them. have you tried goat's products?
Chelsea Willis
2:42 pm on Tuesday, February 28, 2012
shopping locally isn't just about saving some gas money although I agree that shopping within 50-100 miles of your home does save money over shipping in goods from across the country or out of the country. Shopping locally supports farms and keeping money in our local economy to support our communities. Perhaps it is my interpretation but Ohai seems to have personal issues with SMC and that is their choice. There are lots of other local farms to support in the area.
L Salb
10:20 am on Wednesday, February 29, 2012
On a side note, don't forget South Mountain Veggies! The best!
http://www.southmountainveggies.com/home.php
Emily Lowe
11:03 am on Saturday, March 3, 2012
Lots of great comments here! For those who haven't read Michael Pollan's work (Omnivore's Dilemma, In Defense of Food and others) I encourage you to hear what he has to say about the pragmatics of purchasing food: his basic thesis is that every dollar you spend constitutes a vote for that product. If you buy factory-raised chicken breasts at Wal-Mart, you're saying, "I like what you're doing and I want you to keep doing it." If you buy farm-raised whole chicken from a family farm, you're casting a very different vote. It's important to remember this as we make all of our food decisions.
Chelsea, send me an e-mail and I'll put you in touch with a farmer I know who sells goat's milk!