Hi friend!

I often feel a burden to share more information with people like you who are getting introduced to raw milk and cultured dairy products. For the longest time, I’ve been reading books, articles, websites, watching videos and talking to experts about raw milk and I want to share the information I’ve gleaned with you so you can be an informed consumer.

My goal with The Raw Milk Digest is to deliver weekly content that helps you understand, appreciate, and celebrate the beautiful design and benefits of one of God’s most wonderful creations: raw milk from grass-based cows.

The other day I asked my brother a question about a website design project I was considering. He knows all kinds of coding, so he rattled off an answer in techy language I couldn’t follow. I felt a little intimidated by it because I couldn’t relate to what he was sharing.

It was all new to me! Well, that’s kind of the way it is today with most people when you start talking about milk. Most people are totally disconnected from a sense of what real milk is. They assume milk is processed and comes in jugs from the store, and when you start talking about fresh milk from a cow on a farm they think that’s somehow weird!

And maybe you’ve been there too!

Maybe you’ve grown up with milk from the store and never had the opportunity to see where it really comes from and how it’s made.

The problem today is that we’re living in an artificial bubble of time. A very brief (200 year) period where industrialization has turned natural food production into a factory process and everything is manufactured on an industrial scale rather than crafted by local artisans and delivered in it’s natural state.

But it’s exciting that things are changing and becoming more “normal.” There’s a growing movement of concerned people like you who are voting with their food dollar and changing the way food is produced. Back to small scale local production.

So here’s the takeaway for this week’s issue.

Raw milk is normal milk. Pasteurization is a practice invented only about 200 years ago, and although it has played a part in the early days of industrialized food production, it is not normal to heat milk and destroy many of it’s amazing properties.

For now, let me give you three things to think about when it comes to the history of milk and pasteurization.

1. Ancient records show raw milk has been consumed from the earliest times. Even as early as 2000 B.C. there are records from India of milk being used as a highly prized offering to their Hindu gods, and the Bible also tells us of Abraham serving “butter and milk and a calf which he had dressed” to his guests as recorded in Genesis 18:8. I think it’s safe to say that milk was probably consumed shortly after, if not in, the Garden of Eden as told in the creation account in Genesis. That’s just my speculation, but it goes to show that raw milk is historically normal!
2. Pasteurization was invented recently to address an industrial problem. Since most of the milk consumed throughout history has been raw, the question should be asked, “are we healthier today after pasteurization?” Definitely not. In fact, according to the FDA, milk allergies are the top ranking allergy in the United States. Then comes eggs, fish, shellfish and nuts. Pasteurization is the process of heating milk to 155-210 degrees F, which actually causes lactose intolerance and dairy sensitivities. More on that in the weeks ahead. Before Louis Pasteur, practically all milk was consumed fresh from animals raised on pastures and fed mostly grass and people did not have the chronic diseases we experience today like cancer, diabetes, heart disease and arthritis. Like I mentioned earlier, we are living in this artificial bubble of time where industrialized food is thought to be normal. It isn’t.
3. The future of medicine is in holistic care, including a return to real food. As my family has learned about health and treating my mom’s Hashimotos disease, we’ve been introduced to a number of functional medicine doctors via webinars and summits that are all saying the same thing. Get your food, movement, sleep and relaxation in proper balance and most, if not all, of your chronic diseases will disappear. Raw milk and cultured dairy plays a part in creating a cleaner and more “biodiverse” ecosystem of probiotics in your gut. That’s why we often say “food is medicine.”

To wrap up, let me share two helpful links for you to check out this week:

1. RealMilk.com A Campaign for Real Milk Valuable articles and a listing for finding raw milk near you.
2. Raw-Milk-Facts.com Another website dedicated to the benefits and history of raw milk.

Happy reading!

For real food,
Peter Bartlett

P.S. Next week we’ll take a closer look at lactose intolerance, the #1 question I get asked about raw milk! Feel free to share this post with a friend you think might benefit!