Local, Raw Cows Milk

Raw cows milk in my fridge may seem weird to some, but not to me! I grew up with neighbors who had dairy cows. When they had extra milk we would sometimes be given a gallon. I loved it! My mom never really bought milk from the store because she always felt it wasn't good to drink a lot of milk or consume a lot of dairy products I general.

Living with hubby, we've bought a LOT of store bought milk. Milk is one of his favorite things to drink. During some time I spent researching, I really felt we needed to make the switch to raw milk. This particular article from Dr. Mercola's website really helped make this decision easier. So began my hunt for a local dairy farm.

After a little looking around, I came across the Real Milk website. Here I was able to find a famer that offered hormone and antibiotic free, raw cows milk for a price I could justify.

One of the most fun parts of real milk is you get the cream on top too. I've decided to use it to make homemade butter for now but would eventually like to try other things with it too such as cream cheese or whipped cream. Here I am seperating buttermilk from the butter I just ran through the food processor. As a kid, I remember one time where we all passed around a jar of cream and took turns shaking it. Thats too much work for my taste so I pulled up The Prairie Homestead tutorial and followed that instead. Much easier to gain results!

Here we have it: buttermilk on the left and fresh, sweet cream butter on the right. I've been storing the butter in the fridge for now, but may attempt leaving some out on the counter so its soft and ready to use since it gets pretty hard in there.

I like knowing our source of milk because then I know that what we are drinking or using for cooking is not riddled with hormones or antibiotics. There is peace in knowing I'm giving my family the best I can find.