Feds sting Amish farmer selling raw milk locally

[srkruzich]

I'm sure the milk was just fine for sales at the farm, but transport to MD just isn't allowed, especially in unmarked containers with no dates or information on them.

Dates have no meaning with raw milk. As i said before, it ferments with time and never goes bad.  It is a live culture. 

[Diane Amberg]

If I want yogurt I'll make yogurt.

[Wilma]

Whoa there, Steve.  My grandmother and mother made cheese from raw milk without ever introducing anything to it.  Same thing with cream and butter.  Many was the time that we churned the butter by shaking a jar since we didn't have a churn.  The only thing my mother added to the butter was salt.  And yogurt?  Isn't that just clabbered milk that you get by letting the raw milk "ferment"?  Nothing added.  My sister and brother liked the clabbered milk.  I couldn't stand it and to this day I cannot eat yogurt.  I don't know how old you are, Steve, but I would bet that I have many, many years on you for farm experience.

Did you ever candle an egg to see if the bird was developing?  Set 300 chicken eggs in an old-fashioned incubator that was heated by coal oil? 

[Diane Amberg]

I've candled eggs. As a funny aside, many years ago when I was a new fire recruit and the only female, we were opening fund drive envelopes and they were having someone open and check every envelope again to be sure the check was removed, as once in a while one was missed. When I said "why don't you just candle the envelopes?" They looked at me really weird and then broke out laughing. Now several of these guys were local farmers and one said...."Leave to the new girl to teach us a time saver we should have known all along." They started holding the envelopes up to the light and sure enough, it was easy to see if the envelope was empty.
When I was little we had chickens, but we usually bought chicks rather than hatch them ourselves. As far as adding anything I remember the old folks saying lightning would make milk curdle.

[Wilma]

Leaving it at room temperature will do that, too.  That's something that the homogenized, etc. won't do.  It turns sour but it doesn't curdle.

[sixdogsmom]

I love the baby chicks, I always manage to visit the farm store every spring so that I can hear them and smell them. I love to hold them in my hands so that they will go to sleep. 

[srkruzich]

Whoa there, Steve.  My grandmother and mother made cheese from raw milk without ever introducing anything to it.  Same thing with cream and butter.

Only cheese that doesn't require bacteria is cottage.  BUT it does have to have rennet.  For cheddar, farmhouse cheddar, and other semi hard cheeses like that you have to use mesothelic bacteria, gouda, mozzerella, provalone, ect needs thermophelic bacteria.  Some even require molds to make.  Most of your soft cheeses except ricotta, can be made from souring the milk and then adding rennet.

Many was the time that we churned the butter by shaking a jar since we didn't have a churn.  The only thing my mother added to the butter was salt.

Butter isn't something that requires any additon.

And yogurt?  Isn't that just clabbered milk that you get by letting the raw milk "ferment"?  Nothing added.

Nope it also uses a culture.  Most folks go get stonyfield or any brand that has live culture and then adds it to theirs.  You can also buy the powdered culture/bacteria to make your own and then all you do is use about 1/4 -1/2 cup of it to start the next batch.

My sister and brother liked the clabbered milk.

that would be real sour cream.  I make it all the time when i have a cow in.  It is nothing more than setting the cream on the back of the stove and letting it sour and thicken.  

I don't know how old you are, Steve, but I would bet that I have many, many years on you for farm experience.

I don't have as many as you but i was raised on a farm.  And continue to liveo on one now.

Did you ever candle an egg to see if the bird was developing?  Set 300 chicken eggs in an old-fashioned incubator that was heated by coal oil?  

Yes i have and no i haven't done one with coal oil but i have built a incubator that uses lightbulbs to control heat, and humidity in a cabinet chest.  It will hold 500 eggs.  

BTW wilma, i grew up on my grandpas farm, my dad always had  small farm, so i know what it means to get up at 4:30 to milk and do chores before heading off to school,coming home and doing chores milking after school, doing things the old way.  I also have lived off grid for several years, so no electric or running water i do have under my belt and i quite like electricity and runing water myself so i don't plan on going back to it.  I have plowed a field with a mule and a plow, cleared a field of rock with a wagon and horse.  I'm glad i don't have to do it this day and age.

[Wilma]

The clabbered milk that my siblings liked was skim milk that had clabbered the natural way.  The cream was always skimmed off to sell.  When I say skimmed I mean the old fashion way, by hand, not with a separator.  The only cream that was consumed was maybe in Daddy's coffee or after it had been churned.  My siblings even liked buttermilk, the kind that is left after the butter has been removed.  It was good for baking, but not for drinking as far as I was concerned.

[Ross]

Guess who the green  horn is. Me. I have a couple of friends I have learned quite a bit from. When i was a kid a friend owned a farm that I visited that was cool. He'd use a cow horn that was removed from a real cow to call his cows in for milking. They would line up and wait their turn. I never did get the hang of that milking thing, I never got milk. I guess I was to little or just didn't understand. but it was fun anyway.

I have had more fun out here, learning. I've had the experience of helping on of my mares birth. The second mare had no trouble. We raised an orphaned calf and bottled feed her. Needless to say she is a pet now. We just hatched out twenty Delaware chicks with the new fangled incubator. And our Toulose goose just hatched out six babies. It's fun after just three days watching the babies follow the adults to the pond and back to the barn.

I've learned to put up hay. I do a few hundred square bales and the rest in round bales. My tractor is too small to pull a full round bale but that's okay 1/2 size works just fine. My sickle mower and my round baler and my square balers might be consider antiquated but I have managed to repair them and get the work done. I sure am glad this is a small retirement farm. I love it.

[srkruzich]

The clabbered milk that my siblings liked was skim milk that had clabbered the natural way.  The cream was always skimmed off to sell.  When I say skimmed I mean the old fashion way, by hand, not with a separator.  The only cream that was consumed was maybe in Daddy's coffee or after it had been churned.  My siblings even liked buttermilk, the kind that is left after the butter has been removed.  It was good for baking, but not for drinking as far as I was concerned.

Well i think it could also be called clotted cream or milk.  It is basically sour cream.  Cheese requires rennet to produce, it causes it to set and you cut the curd then hang it to drain for cottage cheese.  For other cheeses there are processing techniques like cooking, pressing ect...
I make cheese when i have milk, have several wheels of cheese in the fridge from last year.