Milk and honey

“ There the bees would gather honey from the nectar in the blossoms, and cows would feed on the sweet juices of the grass. It was at this season that the milk, cream, butter and cheese, were the very best of the year. Many a growing boy, counting on his fingers the days, looked forward for months to life outdoors, on the highlands, among the birds, the butterflies and the wild animals. As for the cattle, they could sniff the sweet aroma of the flowery fields and grasses at a distance and long before men could. ”

“ The land literally flowed with milk and honey on such occasions, for the lads were not required to sit at table, but allowed to partake of refreshment as they liked—freedom being the sauce best beloved by the boyish soul. ”

“ So little is to be collected—in the shape of direct testimony, next to nothing—of the domestic life of the Britons—that it is only by conjecture that one arrives at the conclusion that the original diet of our countrymen consisted of vegetables, wild fruit, the honey of wild bees—which is still extensively used in this country,—a coarse sort of bread, and milk. The latter was evidently treated as a very precious article of consumption, and its value was enhanced by the absence of oil and the apparent want of butter. ”

“ We have then to consider chiefly two points in the production and handling of milk, first cleanliness in all manipulations and cleanliness of all utensils, and second rapid cooling and storage or transportation at low temperatures.
Milk is the natural food for all mammals and each species of mammal produces a milk of such composition as is most suitable for the young of the species. The-composition of cat's milk differs from that of cows, dogs or man's. Some animals produce milk which contains ten times as much fat as is contained in cow's milk. ”

“ So far as concerns its purgative qualities, milk is good when made from green stuff, especially if it is grass containing plants which, taken by themselves, have a purgative effect upon the human body. ”

“ Such a food is milk; and, if the human supply is insufficient, we obtain in its place that of the cow, chiefly; and during the first year of life milk constitutes the best form of food. After that time other kinds of nourishment, mostly well-cooked wheaten flour in various shapes, begin to be added to the milk which long continues to be a staple source of nourishment to the young animal. ”

“ Amongst the most nutritive articles of our food are milk, cream, butter, and cheese. There is scarcely any limit to the demand for them, and any process which can increase their quantity without diminishing their quality is desirable. Genuine milk is so desirable that at one time a practice obtained of driving cows to Londoners’ doors, and milking them then and there. ”

“ If you have no cellar that can be kept warm and free from the smell of vegetables, set your milk on a shelf, in a warm closet, where, of course, you will keep no vegetables or meats, as nothing is so easily impregnated with odors of all kinds as milk. Cover the pans or bowls with a fine net, to exclude dust or motes of any kind.
Thirty-six hours is as long as milk should remain unskimmed, summer or winter. Every hour longer, even though the milk may taste sweet, is insuring bitter butter. As you skim off the cream, stir it well each time. ”

“ If all the Mamas who don't buy City Dairy Milk would come and see how much care we take in clarifying, pasteurizing, and putting the Milk in "bottles air tight" and then keeping it cold until delivered, we are sure they would want to give their little girls and boys City Dairy Milk, no matter how much it cost.
Another thing Mamas should remember is that Milk contains just the nourishment that "Our Little Patrons" need, in just the proper proportions to "build up, to stay up, both body and brain," and this nourishment in Milk is in a form more readily digestible than in any other food. ”

“ Of all semi-animal substances, sweet fresh milk is the most wholesome, in itself an almost perfect aliment, welcome to all mammals and nearly all vertebrate animals. Monkeys, cats, deer, squirrels, otters, and ant-bears, creatures that differ so widely in their special diet, will rarely refuse a dish of this universal food. I have seen snakes and iguanas drink it with avidity. On the other hand, I have noticed that all animals but pigs and starved dogs eschew sour milk; it is, properly speaking, fermented milk, to the taste of a normal man probably as repulsive as tainted meat or sour gruel. ”

“ ARTIFICIAL NURSING. Should the mother afford no milk by reason of malformation, or otherwise, the child should be accustomed to the most healthful kind of food from the first. Milk from one animal should be sought. Animals that are fed on corn, hay and fodder, make the best milk in winter; those fed on clover and cured hay, the best in summer. The milk of animals fed mostly on turnips, cabbages, and potatoes, is more apt to disagree with the stomach. ”

“ Cows fed on turnips in the stall always produce butter inferior to that of cows living upon the fresh and aromatic grasses of the pastures.
Succulent food in which water abounds—the green grass of irrigated meadows, green clover, brewers’ refuse, distillers’ refuse, etc.—increases the quantity, rather than the quality, of the milk; and by feeding these substances the milk-dairyman studies his own interest, and makes thin milk, without diluting it with water, though, in the opinion of some, this may be no more legitimate than watering the milk. ”

“ Semolina, or manna croup, being in little hard grains, like a fine millet-seed, must be boiled for some time, and the milk, sugar, and egg added to it on the fire, and boiled for a few minutes longer, and, when cold, used as the other preparations.
2508. Many persons entertain a belief that cow's milk is hurtful to infants, and, consequently, refrain from giving it; but this is a very great mistake, for both sugar and milk should form a large portion of every meal an infant takes. ”

“ But it is even more than this: milk may be regarded as a model food, and as a complete food. It is a model food because it is nature’s own food, designed for the sustenance of the young of animals, and, as such, it contains and furnishes all the nutritive properties in due proportion required by a growing animal. ”

“ Human milk is light and strengthening and much used in eye diseases. Cow's milk increases the secretion of semen. Buffalo's milk induces sleep when taken in large quantities. Goat's milk is sweet and light, and is recommended in phthisis and blood diseases. Sheep's milk is hot, and is believed to promote the growth of hair. ”

“ Among our dairymen the thing of special sanctity was milk. A man in our neighborhood might almost better be accused of forgery or bigamy outright, than to fall under the dreadful suspicion of putting water into his cans.
Whether it was mere stupid prejudice or malignant invention I know not—who started the story was never to be learned—but of a sudden everybody seemed to have heard that Abner Beech's milk had been refused at the cheese-factory. ”

“ Milk carried to a distance, so as to be much agitated, and cooled before it is put into pans to settle for cream, never throws up so much, nor such rich cream, as if the same milk had been put into pans directly after it was milked.
Milk, considered as an aliment, is of such importance in domestic economy as to render all the improvements in its production extremely valuable. To enlarge upon the antiquity of its use is unnecessary; it has always been a favourite food in Britain. ”

“ Scientists agree that milk protects by providing in the best form those necessities which are often lacking in other foods. Milk supplies calcium so necessary for sound bones and teeth, phosphorus, [Pg 160] easily digested protein, butter fat and milk sugar. Most important of all are the vitamins found in milk. Milk acquires these properties from the cow, a living factory manufacturing milk from raw products, which are the foods the cow eats—the pasture grasses and the cured hay, supplemented with carefully blended grain rations. ”

“ The simple fact is sufficiently palpable, that no pure and healthy milk can be produced by an unhealthy and diseased animal; and that no animal can long remain healthy that is fed on an unnatural food, and treated in the manner too common around the distilleries of many large cities. ”

“ Those, then, who desire much cream, or who produce cream for the manufacture of butter, select food likely to increase the proportion of butter in the milk. On the contrary, where the principal object is the production of milk rich in curd—that is, where cheese is the object of the farmer—clover, peas, bran-meal, and other plants which abound in legumine—a nitrogenized organic compound, almost identical in properties and composition with caseine, or the substance which forms the curd of milk—will be selected. ”

“ Milk is the first liquid food taken by man, in common with all mammals, after his birth; and this liquid is so happily ordered, as to contain all the elements of food necessary for him, at this period of his existence. The new-born mammal naturally, and directly after its birth, seeks the fountain of its nourishment, and even that most helpless of all created beings, a baby, is soon taught where to seek its food.
But we have to consider milk as a beverage, more than as a food, and, as a drink, it is comparatively a failure, as to most people it is indigestible, if taken in any quantity. ”

“ Nor are the effects of this diet confined to our species: milk is provender for cattle. It is given to horses where grain cannot be procured, and, together with dates, is the ordinary food of those fabulous steeds, the “Breath of the Desert.”
Milk contains nothing that is superfluous, to impose toil on the digestive organs, or to produce disturbance in the animal laboratory. It is, properly, neither an animal nor a vegetable substance. It is not dead flesh, of which we make our stomachs the sepulchre ”

“ MILK therefore is an oily vegetable Matter, circulated first in Plants, then in Animals, and capable of being reduced into a caseous and watry Substance, (or Cheese and Whey, if you please.) If Milk finds no opportunity of passing off in its own natural form, it turns to Fat, or goes away by Urine and Sweat, which commonly is the case in Men, for they generate Milk as well as Women, &c. ”

“ Whole milk contains everything necessary for growth and maintenance, protein, fat, milk-sugar, salts, water, and the unknown but invaluable accessory substances. It is of such prime importance that each family should have this admirable food that I have suggested that no family of five should ever buy meat until they have bought three quarts of milk. The insistence by scientific men upon the prime importance of milk has probably had something to do with its rapid enhancement in price. ”

“ Ripened with a pure culture of lactic acid bacteria, it makes a healthful, refreshing drink, like buttermilk. Only when it is allowed to sour without proper care or control does skim milk, as whole milk does, become unfit for food or drink. On a cold winter morning when men are going to work (or perhaps are looking for work which they cannot find) , and children are on their way to school, often underfed, a street-corner wagon or stand where boiling hot, fresh, sweet skim milk might be distributed at a cent or two a glass would be a blessing in any city. ”

“ There are distinct restrictions on its use which become more onerous as one ascends in the scale of dairies, and we have seen that there is reason to believe that the whole complicated daily ritual of the dairy may be designed to neutralise the dangers attendant on the conversion of the milk into substances which may be used by the outside world. ”

“ In the eastern part of Europe, milk has always been looked upon as one of the principal kinds of food, but not necessarily the milk of cows, as, from ancient times to the present day, the milk from 2 camels, buffaloes, sheep, and goats has been used indiscriminately throughout the East.
According to Layard,1 "the Bedouins do not make cheese. The milk of their sheep and goats is shaken into butter or turned into curds; it is rarely or never drunk fresh, new milk being thought very unwholesome, as soon by experience I found it to be, in the desert. ”

“ Food for an invalid must always be given in its most digestible forms. Milk is one of the most valuable foods in sickness, not only because it supplies so many body needs, but because it can be used in so many ways,—hot, or cold, flavored or plain, made into junkets or sherbets, combined with eggs in eggnogs and custards, fermented as in kumyss or soured as in buttermilk or zoolak. ”

“ The use of camel’s milk is confined chiefly to Africa and to China, that of mares to Tartary and Siberia, and that of goats to Italy and Spain. The milk of the cow is universally esteemed.
Milk is an opaque fluid, generally white in color, having a sweet and agreeable taste, and is composed of a fatty substance, which forms butter, a caseous substance, which forms cheese, and a watery residuum, known as serum, or whey, in cheese-making. The fatty or butyraceous matter in pure milk varies usually from two and a half to six and a half per cent. ”

“ The milk, as fast as drawn, should be removed from the place of milking, lest it absorb odors from the droppings, the breath, or the exhalations from the cow's body—or even from the sweat and grime of the person and clothes of the milker—for milk is extremely sensitive to these influences. It is much more so than is popularly supposed, and should be put in a sweet atmosphere as soon as possible when drawn. Fine fancy goods, with the most delicious and delicate flavor, cannot be made from milk that has been exposed to the influence of a foul atmosphere. ”