Got Milk?

[rabidsamfan]

Yes, I'm spammy today...

My doctor wants me to get more calcium into my diet. Oh, boy...

Like a lot of grownups, I thought I'd reached the age where drinking milk gave me problems. Digestive difficulties, as it were. Too long an interruption in the milk-drinking habit had reduced the native flora or fauna or whatever lactobacilli are to an insufficient population.

I've changed my mind. Now I think it's the milk, not me. And this is why -- I can drink some milk without any unpleasant repercussions at all.

So, I invite y'all, if you're in the same boat, to try this experiment.

1) Find a store that keeps its milk in enclosed coolers. Something where you have to open the door to get the milk. Especially if it's a small enough cooler that you can see the back wall of it. That usually means a bodega or other very small venue, but what you want is a store that keeps the milk consistently cold. Those huge open coolers at the big grocery stores are right out. Don't even bother.

2) Check the brands they carry and look among them for a local dairy, or if you can't find a local one, a dairy which has a very short cow-to-bottle distance.

3) Bonus points if the dairy doesn't use growth hormones.

4) Take home some of that brand, keeping it as cold as you can (use an insulated bag if necessary) and then keep it in the cooler part of your refrigerator (not on the door!). Never leave it out on the counter.

5) Start with small portions, and work up.

Then let me know how it goes. I'd love to see if this works for someone else.

*goes back to drinking her milk*

Comments

[lame-pegasus.livejournal.com]

Cheese and yoghurt work, too, if you need more calcium. Or green vegetables, like broccoli and beans.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Beans is green? Or do you only mean green beans? Because when someone mentions beans I tend to think of kidney beans first and they're dark red.

Or pink.

Or white.

Or black.

Or light red.

Hmmmm... Time to make some five bean chili again...

[lame-pegasus.livejournal.com]

*laughs*

Green beans.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Just as long as they aren't lima beans. Which are yucky.

Well, not as yucky as they were when I was a kid, but I still only really like them in succotash.

Hmmmm.... succotash.... Now I'm all hungry again!

[unhobbityhobbit.livejournal.com]

Heh, wow, that's almost the complete opposite to what we do. We get the milk delivered, so it's on the back of a milk float for most of the morning and then it's outside for longer if we forget to bring it in (which doesn't matter so much in winter because it's nice and cold, but has lead to the milk going sour before we even opened it in summer).

No idea where the milk is from, really. But I do trust the providers.

And then we keep it in the door of the fridge. Or we leave it out if it's going in tea or coffee (no point in cooling it down if you're going to put boiling water in it). But then we're all fine with drinking milk, never really stopped.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

I bet it's in glass bottles and if not I'll at least bet that it's local. Here in Boston half the milk in the grocery stores got shipped in huge tank trucks from Wisconsin. Yeeesh...

But it definitely tastes better when its kept cold. 1% is nearly as good as whole milk.

[unhobbityhobbit.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, it's in glass bottles, it doesn't taste so nice in plastic bottles (and you can't give back plastic ones for them to re-use).

Cold milk is always best, I agree.

[ansostuff.livejournal.com]

Overnight I stopped drinking milk ten years ago. Now I can have it in small portions once in a while and sometimes I crave it but very rarely. Norway is a little enough country that we don't have many dairies that sell their produce separately and not through the main deliverer, Tine, but there is a couple. The coolers never grow too big though, hence the number of people available to consume the produce, but I agree with you. Milk should always be icy cold.

*hugs*

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

My mom's side has a lot of Norwegian in it, and my mom has had at least one glass of milk every day of her life, as near as I can tell. She doesn't have a problem with any of it. I kind of stopped drinking it (still eating cheese and stuff) and developed problems. So staying used to it matters, I guess.

There's a lot of fuss about lactose intolerance here -- I'm guessing some of it is because we don't get our milk the way we used to. Joseph Lister was able to keep milk drinkable in a glass container for a year, because he kept out all the bacteria. But that took a kind of careful preparation that just doesn't happen on a day to day basis.

[ansostuff.livejournal.com]

I suppose the lactose intolerance would be a greater issue in the US than here if you don't get proper milk. And it's warmer in the US than here so the heat problem would be an issue many places I presume.

mom has had at least one glass of milk every day of her life,
Hehe. :) Many Norwegians live like that. I just had "lunch" (or whatever you'd call it when it's 7pm and you're halfway through your workday) and my colleague had milk with her sandwich.

[rubynye.livejournal.com]

I know it's a bit of a schlep from where you are, but you might want to go up to Harvest Co-Op (Central Sq, right at the T stop) and buy organic milk, in glass bottles, kept in a closed refrigerator case. That's where I'd go to get milk that meets these specifications. It's not *that* much more expensive, either.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

I've got a bodega a couple of blocks away that carries oakhurst dairy milk, and it works just fine. They're in Maine, but they deliver straight to the bodega where I buy it and it's good stuff.

[stillwaters11.livejournal.com]

Heh. I was drinking a glass of vanilla-soy milk as I read your post.
Because of various family needs, my fridge currently holds 1% milk in a regular translucent plastic bottle,the vanilla-soy, and a lactose-free milk.
All three have 30% of the daily calcium per cup. The soy took a bit of getting used to, but I really like it now.
I remember seeing a news story on how dairy products sometimes sit out at room-temp for hours in back rooms before they're refrigerated, so it wouldn't surprise me at all if it was the quality of the milk that affects a lot of people.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

I can drink soy milk, and have, but with all the thyroid problems I'm a little chary of it. Not enough research for comfort. Ah, well.

I hadn't seen any news stories like that, but I believe it!

[gardnerhill.livejournal.com]

Experiment won't work for me. I'm 44 and I still chug the stuff straight from the cow. (Though now these days I'm splurging and getting the organic non-hormone family-farm milk with the cream floating on the top of the bottle.)

Can't stand non-fat, the nasty way it picks up all the flavors in the fridge -- at that point just drink water.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Oooh, really fresh milk! You can even make real buttermilk, from that, which is rare these days.

I shoulda never got out of the habit -- it'd be much easier all around.

[frankymole.livejournal.com]

There's also cheese as an option (for calcium). I find dietary supplements easier.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Ah, but I'm terrible at taking pills. I've got two I absolutely have to have right now and I wind up taking one or the other late two or three times a week and miss entirely about twice a month. And neither pill should be taken within four hours of taking calcium supplements... *rolls eyes*

[slipperieslope.livejournal.com]

A good restaurant is aware of the chill factor and are very careful to keep milk very cold for taste purposes. I can detect 'blinkey' milk, as my Mom calls it, long before it goes bad. I always, always get mine from the local dairy's store and they pride themselves on their fresh milk. Calcium is critical at every age.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

The only time I want to use "old" milk or cream is when I'm making rommegrot. But then again rommegrot was invented to use up old milk and cream...

[siouxieq.livejournal.com]

Have you ever tried Lactose Free milk? It's "chemically modified" if that's a problem - the lactose is turned into glucose and galactose by an enzyme.

I decided a year ago that I should drink more milk but found that I had become lactose intolerant, to the point that half a cup of milk on cereal made me sick all day. I tried all sort of milk, including soy (but am worried about soy and links with cancer), and then found a brand that makes lactose free everything (butter, cream, sour cream, milk). And it is something that you can use normally and people won't turn there noses up at.

It's a great alternative and it is all UHT - but this brand is Australian so I am not sure if you will have the same sort of thing on your side of the pond.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Oh, we've got lactose-free brands here. But it's all sold from these open "cooler" bins and it tastes like it.

What's UHT?

[siouxieq.livejournal.com]

UHT - Ultra High Temperature - a treatment for milk that is put in Tetra packs. A must for small towns where the dairies and processing factories are 300-500km away

[dreamflower]

I've never stopped drinking milk, though I switched from whole to skim about 20 years ago. But I love dairy products. Milk. Buttermilk. Cheese. Ice cream. Cheese. Milk. Sour cream. Butter. Cheese. *sigh*

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Wensleydale? (http://www.wallaceandgromit.net/wensleydale.php)

[gardnerhill.livejournal.com]

What's wrong with Wensleydale?

I was absolutely chuffed to find out that W&G are responsible for rescuing the Wensleydale manufacturers from extinction -- Wallace's preference for that cheeese led to an upsurge in demand.

[claudia603.livejournal.com]

I have milk issues (as I know we've discussed, lol), but I know that I do eat yogurt and cheese a lot! I'm one of those weirdos who eats cereal with yogurt! :D

[melilot-hill.livejournal.com]

That sounds interesting and very plausible. I never stopped drinking milk, though, so I can't try it.