Raw Milk [General]

2008 Aug 19
I looked for a thread to resurrect on this, as I'm sure the various parts of the topic have been expressed before. I particularly remember (hope I'm not fake remembering again :D) some people expressing displeasure with the guvment telling them they can't buy/drink raw milk. Here is a story for fodder about several people getting sick from raw milk... cbs13.com

Thoughts anyone?

2008 Aug 19
Pete, you're not delusional...just not all that observant. Thread is about two weeks old :) In searching for it, I felt a bit like asking my 8-year old niece (the picky one), if she had looked with both eyes when trying to find her stuffed platypus.

ottawafoodies.com

This reminds me a bit of the Mexican pepper scare of July, or the recent iPod Nano incident in Japan (two Nanos caught fire. Parents everywhere screamed "defect").

I remember there being a bee scare about ten years ago in California. My mother refused to buy honey that year. Even though those bees technically made their honey in Argentina.

There are risks in life, it's a silly, but true thing. And there will always be someone there trying to prod you with a taser to remind you of those risks. So, if you're a daredevil trapeze artist, go jump off a building. If you're a daredevil foodie, perhaps raw milk/cheese and fugu are more your thing. Make people sign a waiver and live their own life. Even if that life involves counterfeit cheese. There are more dangerous things out there.


2008 Aug 19
LadyB, I did find that thread, but decided against using it as it was specifically raw milk cheese, not raw milk. I believe ( support anyone? ) that when you make cheese, the good bacteria that makes the cheese will eventually outcompete the bad bacteria, and so using raw milk to make cheese (that is aged at least 60 days) is not such a big deal. If I read the other thread correctly, the 'big deal' was allowing producers in Quebec to make raw mill cheese that is aged less than 60 days, which creates a larger possibility that a bad bacteria infection survives to delivery to the consumer.

I guess part of the bees-nest I was looking to stir was precisely what you said about it should be the responsibility of the consumer. By that reasoning, they should not have required the Mad Cow cull in Britain when they had their health scare, they should just have told people 'There are risks in life'. I believe the actual chance of getting Mad Cow was very very low, probably much lower than the chances of getting Campylobacter in raw milk....

2008 Aug 19
PiO - that's the way it works with making beer. i.e. provide lots of good yeast and it will outcompete any bad bugs in there

2008 Aug 19
I don't really stir bees' nests, usually I throw rocks at them. Much more efficient, really. There were a few other forum topics that could be considered relevant to the raw milk/cheese debate, so I'm glad you decided to just start a new topic :)