• A great bonus from obtaining and using raw unpasteurised milk, is that you get the chance to try your hand at making great foodie cheeses. There are various books for cheese recipes, however I use the recipes from a great book I came across called The Backyard Homestead. You can go for the cheese only book Home Cheesemaking by Ricki Carroll – however for me the Backyard Homestead has all sorts of other fascinating information – especially if you have any intentions of setting up a small-holding, or even of something more modest as eating from your garden year-round. In fact it encourages you to get stuck in as it gives you all you need to produce all the food you need on just a quarter of an acre. If you are lucky enough to get your hands on more land this book shows you with beautiful line drawings & plans of exactly how to set about doing it.

In fact it has perfect plans for: -

• 1/10th of an acre
• 1/4 acre
• 1/2 acre

How amazing to realise that a plot of 1/2 acre using BH’s plan could produce: -

• 50 pounds of wheat
• 280 pounds of pork
• 120 cartons of eggs
• 100 pounds of honey
• 25 – 75 pounds of nuts
• 600 pounds of fruit
• 2000+ pounds of vegetables

The Backyard Homestead has a US slant, however so much is useful for us here in Europe, as also types of chickens and cattle are introduced to us.  It is certainly a great book for someone ‘incubating’ their own ideas of self-sufficiency.  It is especially good for all you Anastasia fans as it lays things out in easy to understand terms for those of us with absolutely no experience of growing or farming, or bee-keeping!

For now I shall be happy and peaceful just making Mozzarella from my beautiful raw unpasteurised non-homogenised milk.

If like me you have been on a search for real milk that hasn’t been processed, pasteurized (heat treated), homogenized or added to, or had bits taken away, then if you live in the UK, you are going to love the availability of country fresh organic raw milk available by internet and delivered to you in the city direct from the farm!  Having lived in central London nearly all my life, and whilst learning and leaning towards more natural nutrition I was forever on a mission to find ‘raw’ milk.  It seemed that you could only get this pure product if you were lucky enough to live near an organic farm in the country.

However, since I escaped to the country from central London 18 months ago, I now live in East Sussex and very near to Hook & Son, an organic farm that will door-step deliver to you in the old fashioned way if you are lucky enough to live within its delivery boundaries.  The very good news now is that Hook & Son are the very first organic farm in the UK to deliver to you through the internet – in fact this is such ground breaking news, that even the BBC has been down to the farm to interview the Farmers responsible, and film the now famous milk-producing cows.  

Here according to father & son Phil & Steve Hook, owners of Longleys Farm, are some of the health benefits of drinking raw milk:

• Raw milk contains multiple, redundant systems of bioactive components that can reduce or eliminate populations of pathogenic bacteria.

• Raw milk consists of important enzymes that aid in assimilating the nutrients present in milk.

• Raw milk serves as one of the best sources for calcium consumption.

• One of the major raw milk drinking advantages is that it contains the beneficial bacteria, which otherwise get destroyed, when the milk undergoes pasteurisation process.

• The British journal The Lancet reported that resistance to tuberculosis increased in children fed raw milk instead of pasteurised.

• Drinking raw milk could reduce adult’s & children’s risk of suffering allergy-related conditions such as eczema and hay fever

• Also, being organic, raw milk has a higher level of Omega 3 in it, good for the heart, and for the brain!

• Above all, raw milk tastes fantastic. Anyone who has tasted the difference between processed milk and fresh raw milk needs no convincing. The full bodied, rich flavour of raw milk speaks for itself.

Of course all milk starts off as ‘raw’ milk whether organic or not.  However historically the problems associated with ‘raw’ milk have been to do with the health risks, particularly with tuberculosis, brucellocis, and bad bacteria such as Salmonella, E. coli & Campylobacter.  With the introduction of pasteurisation, milk was sterilised of these harmful elements, hence the reason for the Food Standards Agency Health Warning “This milk has not been heat treated and may therefore contain organisms harmful to health” on each bottle.

Historically there were problems many years ago.  Before pasteurisation, raw milk had associated health risks, and Tuberculosis and Brucellosis were found in many herds at the time, and these diseases could be passed on through the milk. Also, the actual milking process was very basic allowing contaminants into the milk.

Today however in the UK these baddies are virtually eliminated from all herds, following a stringent eradication programme over the last few decades.  This programme at Hook & Son involves advanced sterile milking equipment, strict hygiene standards, regular analysis & bacteria tests at the milking plant and regular inspections by the Food Standards Agency.  This ensures that Hook & Son produce the cleanest milk with all the benefits of the good bacteria kept in, without any of the problems associated with the past.  In other words the ‘raw’ milk you consume will be a whole food product, and in my humble belief, one that is naturally and easily assimilated by the human body, and so not rejected and possibly the cause of lactose allergies.

If you live in the immediate vicinity of Hook & Son in East Sussex, or if you wish to order through the internet go to the Hook & Son website for full details and further information.  As well, if you are looking for allotments so as to grow your own organic food, check out the link on their website also.  However you MUST purchase the ‘Here come the Girls’ Calendar with prints of the delightful drawings by Veronica van Eijk of many of the cows who produce this milk – the true stars of this wonderful story which surely is proof that we are heading in the right direction – full circle back to what is truly a natural and nutritious way of living.

A great bonus if you are up to it, is that raw unpasteurised milk is perfect for making great foodie cheeses – try making your own mozzarella!

All the best for now.  .  .

Updated 21st Feb’11: Hook & Son now do raw milk cream and butter through their online service.

As well check out the Eat Fat Lose Fat Health page on Raw Dairy Stories

Kaye Tench is an intuitive and advanced energy therapist using Matrix Energetics and The Yuen Method to facilitate health & transformation for her clients in the UK and around the world.  Kaye is passionate about  the new quantum ‘consciousness technology’ and its’ impact on energy healing and our spiritual evolution, and at www.kayetench.com she shares these holistic strategies with her clients, coaches, and other healing arts practitioners.

Our parents, and their parents before us ate foods that were less tampered with by manufacturers. Today however, if we want to eat foods free from additives and preservatives, we need to be both adamant and determined in educating ourselves about where we can find these foods.

Take the simple egg for instance; growing up we were always told that eggs were good for us, and those of us lucky enough actually got to experience what it felt like to hold a newly hatched warm egg in our little hands.

Today however, eggs are one of the basic simple foods where manufacturers have put profit over goodness and health. The simplicity and honest goodness of an egg is under threat, and we are recommended to buy ‘organic’ eggs as opposed to just the normal farm eggs. 

It is however necessary to check the true meaning of the manufacturer’s farmyard claims. And that goes for both ‘organic’ and non-organic eggs. What exactly does outside access mean, and what is the quality of the ground these hens have access to? There is a great deal of difference between a cement courtyard and a lush field fit for foraging.  

Whilst some suppliers are now beginning to become transparent in so far as their products are concerned, some are deliberately using publicity that is confusing; mood eliciting words like ‘farm’, ‘barn’ are used to lure us into a false premise of country goodness.

Mother Earth News in the US, in a recently finished egg-testing project, confirms their 2005 test results showing that true free-range eggs are far more nutritious than commercially raised eggs; and that if we make an effort to track down ‘honest to goodness’ quality eggs we will be rewarded with : -

• 1/3 less cholesterol
• 1/4 less saturated fat
• 2/3 more vitamin A
• 2 times more omega-3 fatty acids
• 3 times more vitamin E
• 7 times more beta carotene

With any program for weight loss or general good health, it is necessary to make good choices regarding the food we buy and eat. The simple egg is a good way perhaps in beginning to make a healthy start.

Till later .  .  .

Kaye Tench is an intuitive and advanced energy therapist using Matrix Energetics and The Yuen Method to facilitate health & transformation for her clients in the UK and around the world.  Kaye is passionate about  the new quantum ‘consciousness technology’ and its’ impact on energy healing and our spiritual evolution, and at www.kayetench.com she shares these holistic strategies with her clients, coaches, and other healing arts practitioners.