It has been a week since the (free) mass quantities of dairy have arrived in the house and we have almost, almost consumed all of it. (And did I mention neither Chef nor I have drank a full glass of milk since elementary school?) Ugh, milk, gross...except with cereal; and Chef reports, with a smile, that he would only drink the leftover milk in the cereal bowl if it had changed colors and was enhanced with - what else- sugar (!). Alternatively, the solid forms of dairy are favored and prized around here: cheese and ice cream, bring it! But since it was all free, hey, welcome to my fridge milk and half-and-half. The whole gang is on the right - whole milk, skim milk, half-n-half, a goat cheese (or what's left), bleu cheese (similar comment), and empty glass bottle of heavy cream (which is now on my hips), and a great addition to our freezer - Chefmade homemade ice cream is in the back left (vanilla w/a speckling of real vanilla beans).
But, the plus side of this dairy haul is that all of it is from local producers who have that organic ethic (yay)! The milk is from a dairy in PA, Trickling Springs Creamery, and the cheese (OMG the cheese) is from about 3 hours west of Baltimore from the FireFly Farms Creamery. The cheese is made from goats, giving it a hint of a sour flavor but so creamy and so fine. I'm not a refined food snob, so I won't say that when I eat this cheese I taste notes of grass and azalea but ... it's totally freshy-fresh cheese from well-taken-care-of animals who are eating what they want and should (not corn, not bonemeal) and the result is purely grande fromage - and I'm just not saying that because it was free, and no, this is NOT a commercial!! Now, the FarmFriends Milk: 1. comes in glass containers, old school, I like!, 2. the cows are pastured, 3. no synthetic hormones rBST or rBGH, 4. has information printed on the bottle about how the dairy-iers use practices that respect the environment. Another neat thing about the milk is that they print the "edition" on the bottle; I'm not sure what that means, but its neat, and yes 2012 appears on our bottles (phew).Final remarks:
this has been a period of forced lactose tolerance for me. for one, we have all this milk and though i would for it to become ice cream, a constant supply of the treat may not be in my best interest; i mean, bikini season is coming up -- oh how i crack myself up! back to that tolerance thing - most people lose their ability to produce lactase, an enzyme that's sole purpose is to digest lactose, a sugar in milk, after their bodies have developed into 'adulthood' (physical, not emotional) - in other words, babies are born with the ability to digest lactose in milk until about the time they are weaned from it. Doesn't that make sense? Look at nature: Lactose is a common sugar found in milk produced by all mammals, and do you see adult animals drinking milk? That's just my bio-geek insight for the day or week; jeez what kind of bio-geek would i be if i only had one insight a week? Anyway, how about I end with a cute pic of Cheez, our resident milk enthusiast?
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